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THE  SCEPTICS  CREED 


THE 


SCEPTICS  CREED: 

CAN  IT  BE  REASONABLY  HELD? 
IS  IT  WORTH  THE  HOLDING? 


%  JleHefo  of  %  popular  gispettsof  HHobeni  Uuhltef. 


BY 

NEVISON  LORAINE, 

VICAK  OF  GROVE  PARK  WEST,  LONDON. 

Author  of  “  The  Church  and  Liberties  of  England “ Discourses 
on  the  Lord’s  Pray  erf  etc. 


NEW  YORK: 

JAMES  POTT  &  CO., 

14  &  16  ASTOR  PLACE. 


i  V 


■ 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 
in  2019  with  funding  from 

University  of  Illinois  Urbana-Champaign  Alternates 


https://archive.org/details/scepticscreedcan00lora_0 


ScX  .Coo  (r.  1^25 


an 


PREFACE. 


JT  is  frequently  observed  that  “  the 
Pulpit  does  not  sufficiently  deal  with 
questions  of  the  day.”  To  meet  that 
objection,  in  my  own  case,  I  invited  my 
congregation  to  suggest  topics  for  a  series 
of  Sunday  evening  discourses. 

Among  the  subjects  proposed  was  “  The 
Sceptic’s  Creed — an  examination  of  popu¬ 
lar  aspects  of  Unbelief.”  This  proposal 
commanded  my  instant  sympathy  and 
prompt  compliance. 

New  difficulties  of  belief,  old  and  often- 
answered  objections,  arrayed  in  modern 


5 


6 


PREFACE. 


attire,  the  hasty  speculations  of  unfriendly 
science,  and  many  plausible  objections  to 
revealed  religion,  find  place  in  the  pages 
of  current  literature.  A  most  active 
Atheist  and  Secularist  propaganda  is 
eagerly  striving  by  popular  lectures,  ex¬ 
tensively  delivered,  and  cheap  publications, 
very  diligently  circulated,  to  spread  un¬ 
belief  in  its  coarsest  and  crudest  forms. 
Among  different  classes  of  society,  in 
addition  to  open  denial  and  defined  un¬ 
belief,  there  exists  a  widely-spread  dis¬ 
turbance  of  religious  conviction  and  much 
indefinite  doubt  in  respect  even  of  the 
very  foundations  of  the  ancient  faith. 
These  facts  are  my  apology  for  giving  a 
larger  circulation  and  more  permanent 
form  to  my  discourses  on  The  Sceptic’s 
Creed.  I  developed  my  notes  into  a 
lecture,  which  was  delivered,  as  one  of 


PREFACE. 


7 


a  series  on  Modern  Unbelief,  to  the 
Young  Men’s  Christian  Association  at 
Liverpool  and  elsewhere.  And  now,  at 
the  request  of  many  friends,  I  venture  to 
publish  it,  somewhat  enlarged,  but  other¬ 
wise  very  slightly  altered  from  its  original 
form.  Both  in  substance  and  style  it  is 
intended  as  a  popular  treatment  of  the 
subject.  Large  and  learned  treatises,  deal¬ 
ing  exhaustively  with  various  aspects  of  un¬ 
belief,  exist  in  great  variety.  Very  many, 
however,  of  those  who  are  disturbed  with 
sceptical  questions  or  distressed  with  re¬ 
ligious  doubt,  and  who  have  neither  leisure 
nor,  it  may  be,  inclination  to  engage  in 
recondite  research,  may  yet  be  willing  and 
even  anxious  to  read  some  easy  handbook. 
To  such  doubters  and  inquirers,  specially 
among  young  men,  I  offer,  with  fraternal 
sympathy,  my  little  volume.  I  trust,  not 


8 


PREFACE. 


only  that  it  contains  no  harsh  words  or 
ungenerous  arguments,  but  that  it  has  no 
undertone  that  can  either  offend  or  jar 
upon  the  feelings  of  the  most  sensitive 
Sceptic. 

I  have  endeavoured  to  examine  with 
fairness,  and  as  fully  as  my  limited  space 
and  purpose  would  permit,  the  expressed 
opinions  of  representative  men  on  the 
subject  in  hand,  and  I  have  used  freely 
some  of  the  very  remarkable  concessions 
and  contradictions  to  which  they  have 
given  utterance  ;  but  I  trust  that  I  have 
been  mindful  of  the  Christian  duty  of 
courtesy  to  those  even  who  have  been 
most  aggressively  hostile  to  Christianity, 
and  that  I  have  treated  with  invariable 
respect  those  distinguished  writers  in 
science  and  philosophy  to  whom  I  have 
referred  ;  many  of  whom,  whatever  may 


PREFACE, 


9 


be  their  attitude  towards  revealed  religion, 
have  done  noble  service  to  the  sacred 
cause  of  truth,  in  various  regions  of  re¬ 
search. 

N.  L. 

Christmas, 

1884* 


ABSTRACT  OF  CONTENTS. 


The  Sceptic’s  Creed.  An  Incident.  Most  Practical  of 
all  Questions.  Nebulous  Unbelief.  Relation  be¬ 
tween  Christianity  and  Modern  Thought.  A  Leap 
in  the  Dark.  Life  for  the  Present  alone  Impossible. 
Balancing  Probabilities :  Aristotle,  Gladstone. 
Christianity  a  Potent  Force  To-day. 

What  does  the  Sceptic  want?  Influence  of  Modern 
Science  on  Sceptical  Opinion  :  the  Evangelist  of 
Science.  Every  Department  of  Inquiry  its  own 
Methods.  A  Professor  of  Science  on  “Probable 
Evidences.”  Prominent  Objections  to  Supernatural 
Evidence.  Author  of  Ecce  Homo  on  Miracles. 

The  Contradictories  of  Unbelief.  The  Creed  of  Christen¬ 
dom — Greg  on  Miracles.  The  Supernatural  possible 
— Proof  impossible.  “No  Traveller  Returns.” 
Discrediting  “the  Evidences.”  Christianity  in 
Ruin,  but  not  yet.  Renan,  Theo.  Parker,  etc.,  on 
Christ.  “  Himself  His  greatest  Miracle.” 

“  Logical  Proof. ”  “The  Pure  Reason  and  the  Emo¬ 
tions.”  Professor  Tyndall  and  Mr.  Fred.  Harrison. 
Testimony  of  Psychology  and  History.  Professor 


12 


ABSTRACT  OF  CONTENTS . 


Huxley  on  “  Religious  Feeling  the  Essential  Basis 
of  Conduct,”  and  “  The  Use  of  the  Bible.”  Mr. 
Herbert  Spencer  on  “  A  Religious  System  an  Essen¬ 
tial  Factor  in  Society.”  Mr.  Fred.  Harrison  con¬ 
fesses  the  Joy-giving  Power  of  Christianity.  John 
Stuart  Mill  on  “  The  Utility  of  Religion.” 

Prof.  Huxley’s  “  Drowning  Sailor,”  and  the  “  Hen-coop” 
of  Science.  Proof  by  Experiment.  Sceptic  Demand 
for  Assurance  :  Reply  :  The  Objection  of  “  Mysteries 
in  Religion ;  ”  Life  a  Mystery ;  Mysteries  of 
Science  ;  Origin  of  Life  ;  Scientific  Speculations  ; 
Theory  of  “  Spontaneous  Generation.”  Cicero’s 
Argument  in  Modern  Form. 

Concessions  of  Pessimists  and  Evolutionists  :  The  Savil- 
ian  Professor  of  Astronomy  on  “  Advanced  Scien¬ 
tific  Knowledge.”  Sir  Wm.  Hamilton,  Professor 
Ferrier,  Agassiz.  A  modern  “  Son  of  Zippor.” 

Agnosticism  :  Knowing  the  Unknowable.  Philosophers 
at  War.  Mr.  Fred.  Harrison’s  attack  on  Agnosti¬ 
cism  :  “A  Mockery  of  Religion,”  “  An  Abhorrent 
Worship.”  The  Sceptic  at  the  Shrine  of  the  Un¬ 
knowable.  An  Erroneous  Diagnosis.  Not  Blind, 
only  not  Seeing.  Morning  possible. 

Positivism  and  M.  Comte.  The  Sceptic  at  the  Altar  of 
Humanity.  What  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer  says  about 
“  The  Religion  of  Humanity,”  its  Calendar,  Cate¬ 
chism,  Sacraments,  and  Saints  ;  “A  Retrogressive 
Religion.”  Worship  of  the  ‘ {  Great  Being  Human¬ 
ity  ”  impossible.  The  True  Ideal — “the  Surprise 
of  History.” 


ABSTRACT  OF  CONTENTS. 


13 


La  Messe  of  M.  Thiers.  “No  Face.”  No  Worship  ot 
an  Abstraction.  “  Corporate  Consciousness.”  Per¬ 
sonality  :  Fatherhood. 

A  .Supreme  Everlasting  Will  admitted.  What  Moral 
Effect  should  Follow?  After  Death,  what? 
Annihilation  a  Gloomy  Phantom.  Science  Knows 
Nothing  of  Annihilation.  “A  Necessary  Postu¬ 
late.”  Antipodal  Creeds.  Christianity  in  Relation 
to  Modern  Thought. 

A  Literature  sui  generis  ;  “  Bibliotheca  Divina  :  ”  Mr. 
Gladstone’s  and  Professor  Huxley’s  Opinions  respect¬ 
ing  it.  Theories  of  Inspiration  :  Human  Definitions 
too  Narrow  for  Divine  Subjects.  A  Brother’s 
Appeal.  A  Catholic  Creed. 


I 


^  V 


“With  strict  reason  the  assertion  has  been  made,  that 
the  question  whether  Christianity  be  true  or  false  is  the 
most  practical  of  all  questions.  .  .  .  It  is  of  all  other 

questions  the  one  upon  which  those  who  have  not  a  con¬ 
clusion  available  for  use,  are  most  inexorably  bound  to 
seek  for  one.  And,  by  further  consequence,  it  is  also  the 
question  to  which  the  duty  of  following  affirmative  evi¬ 
dence,  even  although  it  should  present  to  the  mind  no 
more  than  a  probable  character,  and  should  not,  ab  initio , 
or  even  thereafter  extinguish  doubt,  has  the  closest  and 
most  stringent  application.”  1 


—  The  Rt.  Hon.  IV.  E.  Gladstone,  M.P. 

PATHETIC  mission  took  me  a 


short  time  ago  to  a  well-known 
London  cemetery.  Passing  along  its  cen¬ 
tral  walk,  a  fragment  of  a  printed  page 
lying  on  the  path  arrested  my  attention  ; 
and,  stooping,  I  read  in  bold  type,  “  I 

1  u  Probability  as  the  Guide  of  Conduct.”  Nine¬ 
teenth  Century ,  May,  1879. 


1 6  THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 

know  the  present ;  of  the  future  I  know 
nothing  ;  therefore,  I  live  for  the  present, 
and  let  the  future  take  care  of  itself.” 

As  the  subject  for  a  discourse  on  Modern 
Unbelief,  a  friend  a  few  days  before  had 
suggested  “  The  Sceptic’s  Creed  ”  ;  and 
there  it  lay,  brief  and  defiant  ;  there ,  too, 
in  that  grim  setting,  with  a  thousand 
monuments  around,  bearing  their  melan¬ 
choly  testimony  to  the  perilous  uncer¬ 
tainty  and  inevitable  brevity  of  the  life 
present,  but  witnessing,  also,  that  that  life 
in  its  darkest  hour  may  find  solace  in  the 
hope  of  the  life  future.  And,  alas  !  on  that 
occasion  I  remembered  only  too  vividly 
that  there  was  soon  to  be  added  another 
monument  in  memoriam  of  a  bright  life 
lost  on  the  hills  of  morning — 


“  For  her  the  doubly  dead,  in  that  she  died  so 
young.” 


THE  SCEPTIC’S  CREED. 


17 


It .  was,  indeed,  an  opportune  moment  for 
the  prompt  acceptance  of  the  challenge 
that  unbelief  had  flung  so  defiantly  down. 

Now  in  discussing  some  of  the  more 
usual  aspects  of  current  unbelief,  we  are 
dealing  with  questions  of  the  most  prac¬ 
tical  and  urgent  moment.  “  The  ques¬ 
tion,”  says  one  distinguished  authority, 
“whether  Christianity  be  true  or  false,  is 
the  most  practical  of  all  questions.”  1  And 
another  has  urged  that  “  the  religion  ques¬ 
tion,  whatever  may  be  said  or  done,  is 
the  reigning  question  of  the  epoch.”  3  At 
all  times,  indeed,  it  invites  most  careful 

1  “  Probability  as  the  Guide  of  Conduct.”  Rt. 
Hon.  W.  E.  Gladstone.  Supra . 

2  u  Paganism  in  Paris.”  Pere  Hyacinthe.  Nine¬ 
teenth  Century.  Feb.,  1880. 

Locke  says,  “  Besides  his  particular  calling  for 
the  support  of  this  life,  every  one  has  a  concern  in 
a  future  life,  which  he  is  bound  to  look  after.” — 
Conduct  of  the  Understanding.  Sec.  viii.,  Religion. 

B 


i8 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


thought,  for  it  involves  grave  issues  ;  but 
at  the  present  day  it  is  one  of  command¬ 
ing  consideration,  since,  it  must  be  sor¬ 
rowfully  confessed,  there  prevails,  in  all 
grades  of  society,  great  unsettled  ness  of 
religious  conviction,  active  scepticism,  and 
many-sided  doubt.  Sometimes  these  are 
sharply  defined  and  defiantly  asserted,  but 
more  commonly  they  exist  without  dis¬ 
tinctness  of  apprehension  or  exactness  of 
definition  ;  they  prevail  rather  as  a  nebu¬ 
lous  impression  and  indefinite  quantity — 
a  haze  in  the  atmosphere,  but  a  h&ze  that 
both  dims  and  chills. 

Men  shrink,  for  various  reasons,  from 
giving  defined  shape  and  distinct  expres¬ 
sion  to  their  conviction  in  respect  of  reli¬ 
gion.  Yet  surely  it  is  well  for  the  Sceptic, 
as  for  every  man,  to  give  objective  form 
and  proportion  to  his  confession  of  faith 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


19 


and  canon  of  conduct  ;  to  look  in  the  face, 
with  calm  and  earnest  eyes,  the  creed  by 
which  he  determines  to  live  and  to  die. 

A  general  impression  finds  place,  mainly, 
it  may  be,  among  younger  men,  but  the 
evil  infection  spreads,  that  the  evidences 
which  authenticate  Christianity  have  been 
somehow  exploded,  that  modern  science 
has  pronounced  against  the  primary  facts 
of  the  Christian  faith,  and  that  the  Sceptic  1 
holds  his  position  under  the  general  shelter  ; 
and  encouragement  of  the  most  advanced) 


thought.  There  obtains,  therefore,  a  creed, 
if  so  it  may  be  called,  sometimes  frankly 
professed,  but  more  generally  tacitly  im¬ 
plied,  somewhat  to  the  following  effect  : 
“  The  present  I  know  and  possess  ;  of  the 
future  I  know  nothing.  The  things  seen 
are  plain  and  potent  to  the  senses  ;  the 
invisible  is  the  unknown  and  the  future  is 


20 


1  HE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


the  uncertain.  I  live,  therefore,  for  the 
known  present,  and  let  the  unknown 
future  take  care  for  itself.” 

Now  I  challenge  and  controvert  that 
entire  position.  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
I  deny  alike  **  the  proven  inadequacy  of 
Christian  evidence,  the  destructive  results 
of  scientific  research,  and  the  hostility  of 
the  most  cultured  thought.”  Moreover,  I 
aver  that  the  Sceptic’s  Creed,  “  I  live  for 
the  present,  and  let  the  future  take  care 
of  itself,”  is  intellectually  untenable  and 
morally  a  morass. 

It  would  be  an  interesting  investigation, 
yielding  many  suggestive  considerations, 
but  carrying  us  away  from  the  direct  line 
of  our  present  purpose,  to  endeavour  to 
trace  the  mental  and  moral  mood,  and,  as 
far  as  might  be  practicable,  the  motives 
that  sway  those  who  reject  the  Christian 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED . 


21 


faith  for  the  Sceptic’s  creed.  It  must  be 
acknowledged,  indeed,  with  tender  sym¬ 
pathy,  that  sometimes  the  melancholy 
descent  is  made  with  serious  considera¬ 
tion  and  sad  reluctance  ;  even  with 

“  Thoughts  that  do  often  lie  too  deep  for  tears 

But,  alas!  how  often  it  is  “a  leap  in  the 
dark,”  made  with  a  flippant  egotism  or 
a  mere  sensual  proclivity. 

Christianity  has  its  sublime  declarations, 
its  noble  ethical  principles,  its  historical 
and  internal  corroborations  ;  it  is  a  creed 
confessedly  loftiest  in  thought,  purest  in 
principle,  illumined  with  unique  splendour 
of  immortal  hope,  and  around  it  murmur 
yEolian  airs  of  memory  ;  yet  how  often  it 
is  bartered,  an  ancient  birthright  for  a  mess 
of  pottage  ;  dropped,  indeed — substance 
for  shadow — to  snatch  at  a  creed  that 


22 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


shuts  out  God  and  immortality,  and  shuts 
in  life  within  the  precarious  precincts  of  the 
present — a  creed  of  frigid  negations,  alike 
without  dignity,  delight,  or  expectation  ? 

Such  a  creed  as  “  I  live  alone  for  the 
present,  and  leave  the  future  to  take  heed 
for  itself,”  is  one  that  lies  below  the  level 
of  enlightened  and  thoughtful  belief.  It 
is  absurd  in  theory ;  it  is  impossible  in 
practice. 

“  We  look  before  and  after, 

And  pine  for  what  is  not.” 

Memory  and  hope,  recollection  and  antici¬ 
pation,  are  dominant  forces  in  the  forma¬ 
tion  of  character  and  the  guidance  of 
conduct.  No  man  does  live,  or  can  live, 
for  the  present  alone ;  he  quickens  the 
present  with  expectations  of  a  future, 
more  or  less  remote,  in  which  lies  stored 
those  results  and  rewards  of  effort  and 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


23 


joys  of  hope  that  invigorate  and  ennoble 
life.  But  every  future  is  an  uncertainty. 
No  man  can  lay  his  hand  upon  to-morrow 
and  say,  “  This,  at  least,  is  mine.”  That 
future  of  a  few  years,  a  few  months,  a  few 
weeks  hence  towards  which  anticipations 
may  be  looking  with  such  industrious 
eagerness,  or  joyful  hope,  is  not  an  assured 
possession,  but  only  a  more  or  less  remote 
contingency. 

A  well-known  English  judge,  one  Satur¬ 
day  evening,  at  the  rising  of  his  court,  said 
to  the  jury,  “  Monday  morning,  gentlemen, 
at  ten  o’clock.”  At  ten  the  jury  assem¬ 
bled,  but  the  judge  was  absent.  By 
sudden  experience  he  had  proved  that  the 
future  life  may  be  nearer  than  to-morrow. 
Yet  the  Sceptic  talks,  and  acts  on  the  sup¬ 
position,  of  the  remote  uncertainty  of  the 
future  life,  and  the  assured  possession  of 


24 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED . 


the  life  present.  Yet  in  respect  of  this  life 
we  have  no  actual  possession  of  an  hour 
hence.  Not  a  moment  is  certain  to  us 
beyond  the  immediate  present.  All  our 
efforts,  plans,  hopes,  as  they  spread  them¬ 
selves  into  the  future,  are  justified  only  on 
a  “  balance  of  probabilities.”  But  such  a 
balance  of  probability  may  be  found  as  to 
warrant  and  encourage  the  most  vigorous 
and  self-denying  present  efforts  in  assured 
expectations  of  future  good. 

In  the  article  already  quoted,  by  an 
eminent  statesman,  he  says,  “  Let  it  suffice 
to  bear  in  mind  that  there  is  no  limit  to 
the  strength  of  working  as  distinguished 
from  abstract  certainty,  to  which  probable 
evidence  may  not  lead  us  along  its  gently 
ascending  paths.” 1  But  has  the  Sceptic 
honestly  estimated  the  balance  of  proba- 
1  Vide  supra,  p.  17,  footnote  l. 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED . 


25 


bilities  involved  in  the  grand  argument 
for  a  future  life  ?  Or  has  he  striven  with 
earnest  impartiality  to  balance  the  proba¬ 
bilities  in  favour  of  the  Christian  religion, 
before  he  separated  himself  from  its 
ethical  control,  refused  its  revelations,  and 
rejected  its  hopes  ?  I11  the  every-day 

affairs  of  the  life  present  the  Sceptic 
submits  to  be  guided  and  governed  not 
only  by  what  Aristotle  terms  the  refc/jDjpia, 
“  proofs  positive,”  but  also  by  a  reasonable 
estimate  of  probabilities  ;  for  the  ebcora , 
the  “  likelihoods,”  are  a  considerable  force 
in  determining  the  course  and  conduct  of 
life.  The  Sceptic  would  not  in  reason  be 
justified,  therefore,  in  releasing  himself 
from  the  constraints  and  forfeiting  the 
consolations  of  the  Christian  religion,  even 
though  it  did  not  offer  proofs  positive,  if  it 
vindicated  its  claim  to  Divine  authority  on 


26 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED . 


a  clear  balance  of  probabilities  :  “  ovkovv 
l/cavov  av  Xvay  on  ovk  avaytcacov ,  aXka 

ff  >  ’  '  l 

061  A V6LV  OTL  OVK  €LKOS. 

But  Christianity  is  indisputably  a  most 
potent  fact  and  actuality,  amid  the  domi¬ 
nant  intellectual  and  moral  forces  of  this 
age ;  and  eighteen  centuries  ago  we  know 
that  it  “turned  the  world  upside  down.” 
It  provoked  and  surmounted  the  em¬ 
bittered  hostility  of  the  early  centuries. 
It  conquered  Caesar  and  converted  the 
Roman  empire.  It  has  commanded  the 
devout  homage  and  defensive  skill,  in 
various  ages,  of  men  of  the  most  acute, 
comprehensive,  and  cultured  thought.  It 
has  evoked  in  every  rank  and  condition  of 
society  a  fire  of  devotion  that  many  waters 
could  not  quench,  and  a  firmness  of  fidelity 
that  many  tempests  could  not  shake. 

1  Aristotle’s  Rhetoric.  Bk.  II.,  cap.  xxv. 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


27 


Amid  the  advancing  movements  of 
present-day  activity  it  betrays  no  sign 
of  abated  energy  or  inadequate  leader¬ 
ship.  With  its  lofty  aims  and  benevolent 
enterprises  it  raises  the  whole  tone  and 
temper  of  civilization.  Its  disciples  are 
among  the  foremost  in  liberal  learning, 
and  chief  among  those  who  are  ready  to 
every  good  word  and  work.  From  age  to 
age,  and  amid  all  the  chances  and  changes 
of  time,  it  preserves  the  grand  secret  of 
satisfying  some  of  the  profoundest  yearn¬ 
ings  of  human  life.  It  distils  solace  in 
dreariest  sorrow,  affords  succour  in  gravest 
crises  ;  gives  “  oil  of  joy  for  mourning,  the 
garment  of  praise  for  the  spirit  of  heavi¬ 
ness  ”  ;  brightens  joyful  hours  with  a  sun¬ 
nier  glow,  and  inspires  with  the  exultant 
assurance  of  eternal  life  the  last  moments 
of  mortality. 


28 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED . 


Are  not  these,  then,  and  kindred  facts, 
cumulative  and  commanding  probabilities 
that  should  give  the  Sceptic  pause,  who 
boasts  that  he  lives  for  “  the  present  ” — 
meaning  by  that  term  the  present  life , 
with  its  but  momentary  present  and  only 
probable  future — and  who,  whilst  labour¬ 
ing,  storing,  hoping  for  the  probable  future 
of  the  life  present,  yet  illogically  sets  aside 
or  refuses  to  consider  the  vast  and  varied 
probabilities  that  sustain  the  Christian 
argument,  and  nourish  the  vigour  of  that 
hope  whose  fruition  is  life  eternal  ? 

Now  it  is  said,  in  language  more  or 
less  distinct,  that  “  the  evidences  of  Chris¬ 
tianity  are  inadequate  to  sustain  its 
claims  to  Divine  origin  and  authority  ”  ; 
that  “  it  lacks  satisfactory  and  convincing 
proofs.” 

But  what  does  the  Sceptic  want  in  the 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


29 


way  of  proof?  Is  he  quite  sure  that 
he  has  made  clear  even  to  himself  what 
kind  of  evidence  would  satisfy  him  ?  Has 
he  a  clear  conception  of  the  proofs  that 
he  wants  to  convince  his  judgment  and 
incline  his  will  ?  If  he  has,  ought  he 
not  to  make  known  his  demand  in  spe¬ 
cific  terms — first,  in  justice  to  himself ; 
secondly,  in  fairness  to  those  to  whom 
he  may  make  rightful  appeal  to  assist 
him  in  satisfying  a  reasonable  and  urgent 
inquiry  ?  And,  further,  because  it  may 
be  that  the  Sceptic  is  asking  for  some¬ 
what  that  it  is  in  the  nature  of  things 
unreasonable  to  expect  ;  and  that,  there¬ 
fore,  in  this  high  region  of  inquiry,  it 
is  impossible  to  supply. 

May  it  not  be  that  the  Sceptic  has 
been  content  to  be  discontent,  because 
an  indefinite  and  uncertain  something 


30 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


has  not  been  forthcoming  ?  If,  however, 
he  has  not  determined  in  his  own  mind 
exactly  what  it  is  he  is  seeking,  he  cannot 
reasonably  be  surprised  if  he  has  failed 
to  find  it.  Much  less  can  he  be  justified 
in  affirming  that  this  undefined  something 
does  not  exist — a  conclusion  manifestly 
devoid  of  evidential  confirmation — and 
yet  because  he  thinks  it  does  not  exist, 
he  has  forsaken  the  creed  of  his  childhood 
and  the  faith  of  his  fathers,  and  accepted 
the  cheerless  negations  of  unbelief.  But 
in  adopting  such  a  position  the  Sceptic 
convicts  himself  of  the  most  serious  in¬ 
consistency  ;  for  whilst  in  the  act  of 
renouncing  the  central  principles  of  the 
Christian  faith  on  the  alleged  ground  of 
inadequate  proof,  he  gravely  adopts  a 
destructive  and  hopeless  speculation  that 
is  itself  entirely  unproven. 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


But  let  us  take  a  further  step. 

The  temper  and  tone  of  sceptical 
thought  in  recent  years  have  doubtless 
been  affected  to  a  considerable  degree 
by  the  methods  and  results  of  modern 
scientific  inquiry.  There  is  a  widely 
diffused  but  clearly  inaccurate  opinion, 
that  scientific  discovery  is  the  brilliant 
monopoly  of  modern  times  ;  yet  assuredly 
to  earlier  ages  belongs  the  honour  of 
having  laid  broad  and  deep  the  founda¬ 
tions  on  which  rises  the  noble  super¬ 
structure  of  modern  science ;  and  if  those 
earlier  ages  were  less  fertile  in  results, 
they  were  not  less  remarkable  for  in¬ 
ventive  ingenuity  and  inquisitive  observa¬ 
tion.  But  the  quickened  activities  of 
intellectual  enterprise,  enjoying  the  freer 
opportunities  and  improved  apparatus  of 
modern  times,  have  made  more  numerous 


32 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED . 


excursions  into  the  regions  of  scientific 
research,  and  have  brought  from  thence 
their  spolia  opima.  The  brilliant  con¬ 
quests  of  recent  scientific  adventure  are 
made  known  by  the  wonderful  facilities 
now  possessed  for  reaching  the  public 
ear  ;  and  it  may  be  that  these  conquests 
have  been  occasionally  unduly  magnified 
or  hastily  misinterpreted  ;  and  that  they 
have  excited  somewhat  feverish  miscon¬ 
ceptions.  But  deliberately  examined  and 
viewed  in  their  true  light,  they  are  indeed 
a  noble  addition  to  the  sum  total  of 
human  knowledge. 

Now  the  achievements  and  conquests 
of  the  pioneers  of  scientific  adventure 
must  be  of  profound  interest  to  those 
specially  who  believe  that  the  universe 
exhibits  the  handiwork  and  declares 
the  glory  of  a  Personal  Intelligence  and 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


33 


Beneficent  Will.  The  scientist  is  the 
apostle  of  natural  order.  Sometimes, 
indeed,  being  a  man  of  like  passions 
with  others,  he  is  narrow,  bigoted,  and 
intolerant  ;  then  he  must  be  “  withstood 
to  the  face,  because  he  is  to  be  blamed”  ; 
but,  sent  forth  on  a  noble  mission,  to 
lift  the  veil  and  penetrate  to  the  inmost 
shrine  of  nature,  to  learn  her  divine  secrets 
and  to  interpret  them,  “  his  feet  are 
beautiful  upon  the  mountains,  as  he 
bringeth  good  tidings  ”  of  the  wisdom, 
power,  and  beneficence  that  underlie 
matter,  force  and  law  ;  and,  by  that 
Christian  confederation  pre-eminently 
which  recognises  the  universe  as  a 
creation  by  Intelligent  Fatherhood,  the 
scientist  should  be  hailed  as  an  ally  and 
succoured  as  a  colleague — for  he  too  is 
doing  the  work  of  an  evangelist. 


c 


34 


THE  SCEPTIC’S  CREED. 


Whilst,  therefore,  acknowledging  with 
respect  and  gratitude  the  patience,  as¬ 
siduity,  acute  observation,  and  manifold 
labours  of  eminent  physicists,  yet  it  must 
not  be  forgotten  that  every  department 
of  human  inquiry  has  its  own  proper 

i 

methods  and  results.  Scientific  facts  may 
be  so  demonstrated  that  they  must  of 
necessity  produce  intellectual  conviction. 
Denial  would  be  rationally  impossible. 
But  facts  belonging  to  the  sphere  of  reli¬ 
gious  thought  and  inquiry  are  not  capable 
of  the  same  kind  of  treatment.  The 
evidences,  however,  that  sustain  human 
trust  in  the  Divine  existence,  faith  in  the 
Christ  of  history,  and  the  hope  of  the 
future  life,  though  they  are  dissimilar  from 
those  that  are  granted  to  the  physical 
inquirer,  yet  are  not  inferior  in  degree — 
they  yield  to  their  possessor  enlightened 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


35 


contentment  and  an  impregnable  moral 
conviction. 

The  scientist  with  instruments  of  highest 
ingenuity,  and  by  calculations  of  mathe¬ 
matical  exactness,  demonstrates  some  of 
his  discoveries  ;  many  of  the  conclusions 
of  science,  however,  as  certainly  as  the 
declarations  of  revelation  demand  the  ex¬ 
ercise  of  faith.  But  the  questions  which 
lie  properly  within  the  domain  of  religious 
inquiry  must  be  treated  by  other  though 
not  less  satisfactory  methods,  than  those 
of  ordinary  scientific  research.  The 
Divine  existence  cannot  be  demonstrated 
like  the  Copern ican  system  or  the  corre¬ 
lation  of  forces.  The  physicist  proves 
and  illustrates  by  experiment  the  un- 
dulatory  theory  of  light,  its  “radiant 
energy,”  or  the  convertibility  of  heat ; 
but  such  methods  are  not  at  the  command 


36 


THE  SCEPTIC’S  CREED . 


of  the  Christian  apologist  ;  yet  the 
doctrine  of  a  future  life,  and  the  central 
verities  of  the  Christian  faith,  are  sustained 
by  evidences  as  powerful  to  win  the  assent 
of  enlightened  trust  and  the  homage  of 
moral  conviction.1 

1  “  The  right  of  the  Spiritual  World  to  speak 
of  its  own  phenomena  is  as  secure  as  the  right 
of  the  Natural  World  to  speak  of  itself.  What 
is  Science  but  what  the  Natural  World  has  said 
to  natural  men  ?  What  is  Revelation  but  what 
the  Spiritual  World  has  said  to  Spiritual  men  ? 
Let  us  at  least  ask  what  Revelation  has  announced 
with  reference  to  this  Spiritual  Law  of  Biogenesis  ; 
afterwards  we  shall  inquire  whether  Science,  while 
endorsing  the  verdict,  may  not  also  have  some 
further  vindication  of  its  title  to  be  heard.” — 
Natural  Law  in  the  Spiritual  World  (Drummond), 
cap.  “  Biogenesis,”  p.  73. 

“There  is,  then,  no  distrust  of  Science.  .  .  . 

Its  method  and  its  results  are  worthy  of  all  praise 
and  of  all  gratitude,  if  only  we  recognise  their 
due  limits.  A  calm  consideration  of  them  must 
lead  to  the  conclusion  that  there  are  problems 
set  to  us  by  our  own  knowledge  and  experience 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


37 


The  Savilian  Professor  in  the  University 

of  Oxford,  in  an  admirable  paper,1  says 

which  are  utterly  insoluble  by  the  methods  of 
Science,  as  these  are  expounded  and  applied. 

.  .  .  Our  contention  is  shortly  this,  that  the 

method  which  is  sufficient  when  dealing  with  the 
phenomena  of  inorganic  nature  is  insufficient  when 
we  enter  on  the  sphere  of  organic  life  ;  that  the 
method  which  is  adequate  for  organic  life  is  in¬ 
sufficient  to  deal  with  the  phenomena  of  conscious 
life  ;  and  even  the  method  which  deals  with  con¬ 
scious  life  has  to  be  extended  and  modified  when 
it  deals  with  the  complex  phenomena  of  personal 
and  social  life.  In  every  higher  sphere  to  which 
Science  comes,  it  must  recognise  the  existence  of 
new  principles  and  new  forces,  added  differences 
which  cannot  be  merged  in  a  lower  identity.  .  .  . 
In  the  Materialistic  explanations  of  the  universe, 
we  find  that  the  formula  of  Materialism  works 
very  well  until  the  phenomena  of  consciousness 
emerge,  and  theVi  it  breaks  down.”  Et  seq. — Is 
God  Knowablef  (Iverach)  cap.  i.,  “Statement 
of  the  Question;”  vide  also  cap.  iii.,  “Anthropo¬ 
morphism,”  and  cap.  v.,  “  The  Agnosticism  of 
Science.” 

1  Modern  Science  and  Natural  Religion.  Lon¬ 
don,  S.P.C.K. 


38 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


in  respect  of  Christian  evidences,  “  These 
evidences,  from  the  very  nature  of  the 
case,  cannot  be  mathematical  or  demon¬ 
strative  or  scientific ;  they  belong  rather 
to  that  class  of  evidence  which  we  call 
probable ;  and  to  that  class,  be  it  ob¬ 
served,  upon  which  alone  we  determine 
the  conduct  of  our  lives,  for  ‘to  us  pro¬ 
bability  is  the  guide  of  life.’  And  though 
these  probable  evidences  range  greatly 
in  degree,  and  although  not  any  of  them 
taken  alone  and  by  itself  may  be  sufficient 
to  command  entire  consent,  and  enforce 
an  absolute  conviction,  nevertheless,  when 
taken  altogether,  they  may — they  often 
do — by  their  consilience  from  many  dif¬ 
ferent  and  independent  sources,  furnish 
the  mind  with  the  highest  moral  certainty 
of  which  it  is  capable.”  And  as  an 
example  of  “  moral  certainty,”  a  distin- 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


39 


guished  logician  says,  “  the  belief  that 
there  is  a  future  life,  which  though  not 
absolutely  demonstrable,  rests  upon  such 
grounds  that  it  ought  to  influence  the 
conduct  [mores)  of  every  man.  ” 1 

Let  us  now  proceed  to  deal  with  the 
most  prominent  objections  urged  by 
current  sceptical  opinion,  by  considering 
some  of  those  “  evidences  ”  that  more 
directly  confront  the  Sceptic’s  Creed. 
These  cumulative  and  “consilient”  evi¬ 
dences  can  only  be  partially  and  briefly 
treated,  indicated  rather  than  exhausted 
within  the  limited  confines  of  this  argu¬ 
ment.  Yet  it  may  be  possible  to  show 
that  a  creed  without  God,  Christ,  or  im¬ 
mortality — life  for  the  present,  without 
thought  or  care  for  the  future — is  inade- 

1  Otttlines  of  the  Necessary  Laws  of  Thought. 
Archbishop  Thompson. 


40 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


quate  to  the  measure  of  human  need, 
intellectually  unreasonable,  and  morally 
degrading :  a  creed  alike  without  support 
or  shelter  from  the  most  recent  science 
or  the  most  cultured  thought. 

It  has  been  urged,  and  with  a  widely 
sustained  opinion,  prevalent  in  different 
ages  and  among  various  races  of  men, 
that  “  a  supernatural  revelation  can  only 
be  supported  by  supernatural  evidences.” 
The  believer  in  the  Christian  religion, 
however,  affirms  that  such  evidences  have 
been  most  amply  and  satisfactorily  sup¬ 
plied.  We  shall  see  presently  for  our¬ 
selves  some  of  the  evidences  which  justify 
this  opinion.  But  in  the  meantime  let 
us  appeal  to  an  impartial  and  highly 
competent  witness,  a  distinguished  scholar 
and  critic,  the  author  of  Ecce  Homo .  He 
says,  “The  fact  that  Christ  appeared  as 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


4i 


a  worker  of  miracles  is  the  best  attested 
fact  in  His  whole  biography,  both  by 
the  absolute  unanimity  of  all  the  wit¬ 
nesses,  by  the  confirmatory  circumstances 
just  mentioned,  and  by  countless  other 
confirmations  of  circumstances  not  likely 
to  be  invented,  striking  sayings  insepar¬ 
ably  connected  with  them,  etc.,  in  par¬ 
ticular  cases.”  1  And  again,  “  Miracles 
are,  in  themselves,  extremely  improbable 
things,  and  cannot  be  admitted  unless 
supported  by  a  great  concurrence  of 
evidence.  For  some  of  the  evangelical 
miracles  there  is  a  concurrence  of  evidence 
which,  when  fairly  considered,  is  very 
great  indeed  ;  for  example,  for  the  Re¬ 
surrection,  for  the  appearance  of  Christ 
to  St.  Paul,  for  the  general  fact  that 


1  Ecce  Homo.  Preface  to  fifth  edition. 


42 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


Christ  was  a  miraculous  healer  of  disease 
The  evidence  by  which  these  facts  are 
supported  cannot  be  tolerably  accounted 
for  by  any  hypothesis  except  that  of  their 
being  true.  And  if  they  are  once  ad¬ 
mitted,  the  antecedent  improbability  of 
many  miracles  less  strongly  attested  is 
much  diminished.”1 

Here,  then,  is  the  opinion  of  an  acute 
and  impartial  critic,  who,  standing  himself 
outside  the  pale  of  orthodox  opinion,  and 
having  weighed  with  dispassionate  care 
the  evidences  in  favour  of  the  super¬ 
natural  in  the  life  and  work  of  Christ, 
is  constrained  to  confess  that  “they 
cannot  be  tolerably  accounted  for  by 
any  hypothesis  except  that  of  their  being 
true.” 


1  Cap.  ii. 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


43 


But  now  we  are  met  by  an  opposite 
objection.  A  curious  chapter  might  be 
written  on  “  the  contradictories  of  unbelief.” 
The  statement  is,  “no  testimony  reaches 
to  the  supernatural,  but  only  to  apparent 
and  sensible  facts  and,  further,  that 
“  the  probabilities  of  mistake  on  the  part 
of  the  witnesses  are  greater  than  the 
probability  of  the  supernatural  events 
attested.”  Therefore,  according  to  this 
view,  “  the  supernatural  cannot  be  proven 
on  testimony.”  This  form  of  assault  has, 
however,  been  modified  to  a  certain  ex¬ 
tent,  and  in  a  really  remarkable  fashion, 
though  in  terms  sufficiently  explicit,  by 
the  well-known  author  of  The  Creed  of 
Christendom}  Now,  as  he  held  an 

eminent  place  in  letters,  elaborately  dis- 

1  The  Creed  of  Christendom.  By  W.  Rathbone 
Greg.  Cap.  xiii.,  Miracles 


44 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


cussed  the  question  immediately  in  hand, 
forcibly  represented  a  considerable  school 
of  objectors,  was  undoubtedly  a  sincere 
seeker  after  truth,  and  here  illustrates  the 
kind  of  plausible  and  perilous  statements 
by  which  so  many  are  wafted  across  the 
gloomy  sea  of  religious  doubt,  we  propose 
to  examine  with  some  care  his  statement 
in  respect  of  the  supernatural.  “Miracles,” 
says  our  author,  “  can  never  be  proved 
by  documentary  evidence.”  A  less  than 
“never”  is  an  impossible  quantity  in 
any  calculation ;  but  he  adds,  “  least  of 
all  by  such  documentary  evidence  as  we 
possess.”  He,  however,  further  explains 
and  qualifies  his  meaning  as  follows  : 
“  We  fully  admit,  at  the  outset  of  our 
argument,  that  a  miracle,  as  well  as  any 
other  occurrence,  is  capable  of  proof  by 
testimony — provided  only  the  testimony 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED . 


45 


be  adequate  in  kind  and  in  quantity. 
The  testimony  must  be  of  the  same  kind 
as  that  on  which  we  should  accept  any 
of  the  more  sure  and  marvellous  among 
natural  phenomena,  and  must  be  clear, 
direct,  and  ample,  in  proportion  to  the 
marvellousness,  anomalousness,  and  rarity 
of  the  occurrence.  This,  it  appears  to 
us,  is  all  that  philosophy  authorizes  us 
to  demand  for  the  authentication  of  the 
fact  part  of  a  miracle.” 

Miracles,”  we  say,  “  are  not,  and  never 
can  be,  a  sure  foundation  for  a  revealed 
religion — an  historic  creed.  .  .  .  Now, 

miracles  are  evidence  only  to  those  who 
see  them  or  can  sift  the  testimony  which 
affirms  them.  Therefore,  a  revelation, 
whose  credentials  are  miracles,  can  be  a 
revelation  only  to  the  age  in  which  it 
appears.  The  superhuman  powers  of  its 


46 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


Preacher  can  authenticate  it  only  to  those 
who  witness  the  exertion  of  them,  and — 
more  faintly  and  feebly — to  those  who 
have  received  and  scrutinized  their  direct 
testimony.”  And  in  yet  further  limitation 
of  the  practicable  possibilities  of  the  case, 
our  author  introduces  a  learned  mathema¬ 
tician’s  “calculation,”  which  indeed,  he 
says,  “  many  will  think  puerile,”  and  I 
venture  to  add,  not  a  few  will  think 
ridiculous,  to  the  following  effect :  “  The 
concurring  testimony  of  six  independent , 
competent ,  veracious  witnesses  would  suffice, 
but  not  lessd 

The  ground  here  taken  is  theoretically 
very  different  from  that  of  the  two  im¬ 
mediately  preceding  objections  to  the 
validity  of  Christian  evidences,  but  it  pro¬ 
duces  results  equally  destructive.  The 
theory  of  our  author,  then,  is  :  (i)  Miracles 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


47 


may  occur  ;  (2)  they  may  convince  actual 
observers — these  concessions  are  so  much 
gained — ;  (3)  they  may  be  satisfactorily 
attested  by  the  spoken  testimony  of  “six  ” 
eye-witnesses  :  “  but  7iot  less If,  then,  by 
any  unhappy  accident,  since  there  is  appar¬ 
ently  some  mysterious  mathematical  merit 
in  the  number  six,  these  testes  oculati 
should  be  diminished  to  five ,  the  unhappy 
pentarchy  would  be  as  valueless  in  the 
witness-box  as  five  ciphers  preceded  by 
no  numeral  in  an  arithmetical  calcula¬ 
tion. 

But  further,  if  even  the  “six,”  whose 
spoken  testimony  would  be  sufficient  to 
prove  a  miraculous  occurrence,  were  to 
commit,  with  whatever  precautions,  their 
testimony  to  writing,  the  document  would 
be  evidentially  valueless,  since  “miracles 
can  never  be  proved  by  document etry  evi- 


48 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


dence.”  Liter  a  scripta  manet,  but  in  this 
case,  alas  !  that  which  constitutes  its 
permanence  destroys  its  validity  !  Now 
let  us  press  this  elaborate  theory  to  its 
logical  results,  and  we  shall  find  to  what 
an  unreasonable,  not  to  say  absurd,  con¬ 
clusion  this  theory  of  unbelief  inevitably 
leads. 

Suppose  then,  by  way  of  illustration, 
that  an  event  supernatural  should  occur — 
the  possibility  has  been  granted — in  the 
presence  of  dumb  witnesses,  and,  save  for 
lack  of  speech,  of  indisputable  competence 
intellectual,  moral,  and  numeral  ;  yet  they 
could  not  prove  the  occurrence  of  the 
miracle,  since  they  would  be  necessitated 
to  do  so  in  writing,  and  “  miracles  can 
never  be  proved  by  documentary  evidence.” 
We  anticipate  a  probable  objection  to  this 
inference,  and  we  shall  reply  to  it  pre- 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


49 


sently.  But,  first,  let  us  take  another 
illustration. 

Suppose  that  “  six  ”  or  more  competent 
witnesses  should  see  a  miracle  in  Jeru¬ 
salem,  London,  or  New  York,  they  could, 
according  to  the  author  of  The  Creed  of 
Christendom ,  only  attest  the  event  satis¬ 
factorily  or  conclusively  to  those  who 
could  personally  interview  these  witnesses  ; 
for  he  adds,  “  the  essence  of  the  whole 
question  lies  in  this,  that  we  have  not 
the  Apostles  and  Evangelists  to  cross-ex¬ 
amine.”  But  manifestly  not  “  wholly  in 
this!”  If  we  had  the  “Apostles  and 
Evangelists,”  to  whom  we  owe  the  Gospel 
narratives,  they  would  be  two  short  of  the 
mathematical  minimum  ;  and  something, 
also,  would  depend  upon  the  capacity  of 
the  cross-examiners  ! 

This,  however,  is  the  distinct  contention 

D 


5o 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED . 


of  our  author,  that  if  a  miracle  were 
wrought,  not  only  before  “  six  ”  select 
witnesses,  but  even  “  in  presence  of  five 
hundred  brethren,”  in  any  of  the  great 
centres  of  civilization,  the  miracle  could 
only  be  satisfactorily  proved  to  those  who 
could  personally  cross-examine  the  eye¬ 
witnesses,  and  that  there  are  no  resources 
available  to  intelligence  and  culture  by 
which  they  could  give  in  any  trustworthy 
and  evidentially  conclusive  manner  pub¬ 
licity  and  literary  perpetuity  to  their  tes¬ 
timony.  In  short,  supposing  a  miracle 
to  be  wrought  in  London — and  the  pos¬ 
sibility  of  a  miracle  is  not  in  dispute — it 
would  be  simply  impossible  to  transmit 
to  Newcastle  or  New  York  the  tidings  in 
any  written  form,  so  authenticated  as  to 
be  adequate  proof  of  the  occurrence  of  the 
supernatural  event.  If  some  grave  in 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


5i 


Westminster  Abbey  were  to  give  back  to 
life  its  illustrious  dead,  it  would  be  im¬ 
possible  to  frame  documents  that  could 
prove  the  occurrence  of  the  miracle  to 
residents  in  New  England  or  Northumber¬ 
land.  Can  such  a  conclusion  be  seriously 
accepted  ?  Yet  to  this  it  must  come  if 
“  miracles  can  never  be  proved  by  docu¬ 
mentary  evidence.” 

The  more  enlightened  advocates  of  such 
a  theory  would  naturally  shrink  from  being 
forced,  by  the  inexorable  necessities  of 
logical  deduction,  into  such  an  absurd 
position ;  and  probably  they  would  en¬ 
deavour  to  evade  the  indefensible  con¬ 
clusion  by  contending  against  the  fore¬ 
going  illustrations,  that  “  it  would  be  pos¬ 
sible,  both  in  respect  of  the  dumb  and  the 
distant,  to  adopt  such  cautionary  methods 
in  receiving  and  recording  the  concurrent 


52 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


evidence  of  credible  eye-witnesses,  of 
attesting  it  by  the  counter-signature  of 
competent  cross-examiners,  so  as  to  pro¬ 
duce  a  scientifically  attested  and  verified 
record,  that  might  be  multiplied  by  the 
press  for  circulation  to  the  uttermost  parts 
of  the  earth,  and  which  would  be  con¬ 
clusive  evidence  and  incontestable  proof 
of  the  supernatural  occurrence.”  But  this 
would  be  proof  by  documentary  evidence. 

Now  if  it  be  possible  to  obtain  authenti¬ 
cated  documents,  that  would  be  legitimate 
and  conclusive  evidence  of  the  super¬ 
natural  to  those  who  are  five  hundred  or 
five  thousand  miles  distant  in  space  from 
the  occurrence,  they  would  be  equally 
authentic  and  conclusive  to  those  who  are 
twelve  months  or  twelve  centuries  distant 
in  time  from  the  occurrence.  The  docu¬ 
ments  once  sufficiently  verified  for  the 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED . 


53 


absent,  i.e.  the  distant  in  space  or  time, 
they  require  only  to  be  carefully  protected 
and  securely  transmitted,  for  they  remain, 
like  the  ancient  lawgiver,  their  natural 
force  unabated  by  lapse  of  years. 

Otherwise,  indeed,  we  are  driven  into 
another  absurdity  of  conclusion.  For  if 
the  credibility  of  documentary  evidence 
necessarily  diminishes  in  the  process  of 
years,  we  are  compelled  to  acknowledge 
that  there  must  be,  in  respect  of  any 
event,  however  remarkable  and  historically 
attested,  a  vanishing  point  of  distance, 
from  the  date  of  the  occurrence,  at  which 
it  is  simply  impossible  to  prove  it — a 
point,  therefore,  at  which  the  most  vera¬ 
cious  historic  statements  must  descend  to 
the  rank  of  fiction,  since  they  are  equally 
incapable  of  proof.1 

1  Let  me  refer  the  Sceptic  who  desires  to  in- 


54 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


In  other  words,  we  must  confess,  in  re¬ 
spect  of  the  most  notable  events,  that 
there  is  an  imaginary  line  in  time  some¬ 
where,  not  by  any  means  determined  or 
determinable,  up  to  which  the  authenti¬ 
cated  record  of  an  event  goes  in  and  out 

quire  more  carefully  into  the  documentary  validity 
of  the  Gospels,  and  into  the  formation  of  the 
Canon  of  Holy  Scripture,  to  Dr.  Westcott’s 
History  of  the  Canon  of  the  New  Testament. 

The  Bible  in  the  Church ,  by  the  same  author, 
is  “  a  popular  account  of  the  collection  and  re¬ 
ception  of  the  Holy  Scriptures  in  the  Christian 
Church.”  Reasonable  Apprehensions  and  Re¬ 
assuring  Hi?its  (Rev.  H.  Footman),  an  admirable 
little  book  for  the  times,  written  with  candour, 
courage,  and  skill,  contains  in  Sec.  III.  “Critical 
Difficulties,”  some  valuable  suggestions  in  respect 
of  the  testimony  to  Christ  of  the  first  and  second 
centuries.  For  popular  use,  Thomas  Cooper’s 
Bridge  of  History  over  the  Gulf  of  Time  is  a 
most  excellent  handbook.  The  author  has 
answered  in  easy  form  objections,  the  frequency 
and  force  of  which  he  himself  had  known  but 
too  well. 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


55 


among  men  in  bodily  form  and  vital 
reality  ;  but  crossing  that  fatal  line,  it 
exhales,  and  becomes  henceforth  a  pale 
and  disembodied  ghost,  flitting  across  the 
undisturbed  memory  of  the  world  !  Is 
this  a  reasonable  or  credible  opinion?  But 
it  is  the  logical  result  of  the  theory  in 
respect  of  the  testimony  to  Christian 
miracles  of  the  author  of  Tie  Creed  of 
Christendom. 

Let  us  now  turn  to  the  objection  to 
the  validity  of  the  testimony  to  miracles 
quoted  first.1 

“  No  testimony  reaches  to  the  super¬ 
natural,  but  only  to  apparent  and  sensible 
facts.”  The  supernatural,  then,  is  pos¬ 
sible,  but  it  is  impossible  to  certify  its 
manifestations.  But  the  sceptical  objec- 


1  Vide  p.  43. 


56 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED . 


tor  who  takes  this  ground  will,  at  least, 
admit  that  “  God  is  possible,”  since  he 
admits  the  possibility  of  the  supernatural. 
Moreover,  the  declaration  of  the  ancient 
Psalmist,  that  it  is  “  the  fool  ”  that  hath 
said  in  his  heart,  “  There  is  no  God,” 
is  sustained  by  the  modern  scientist. 
Professor  Huxley  speaks  of  the  “  un¬ 
surpassed  absurdity  of  the  philosopher 
who  tries  to  prove  that  there  is  no 
God.”  1 

But  granted  the  possibility  of  God,  it  is 
at  least  possible  that  He  may  interrupt  the 
usual  order  of  antecedent  and  consequent 
in  natural  phenomena,  and  produce  an 

1  Fortnightly  Review ,  Nov.  1874. 

“Atheism  .  .  .  is  speculatively  monstrous.” 

“  Atheism  is  but  another  name  for  feebleness.” 

“  Atheism,  that  demoralizing  palsy  of  human 
nature.” — Natural  Religioti ,  by  the  author  of  Ecce 
Homo. 


THE  SCEPTIC’S  CREED . 


57 


event  supernatural.  The  sceptical  con¬ 
tention  is,  however,  “  no  testimony  can 
authenticate  the  supernaturaL,,  His 
theory,  therefore,  is  this  :  “  miracles  are 
possible,  but  it  is  impossible  to  prove  their 
occurrence.”  God  may  be  ;  He  may  make 
a  revelation  of  Himself;  He  may  accredit 
that  revelation  by  supernatural  attestation, 
but  it  is  impossible  in  the  nature  of  things 
for  one  man,  or  a  group  of  men,  to  certify 
the  occurrence  of  the  supernatural  event. 
The  highest  miracle,  therefore,  according 
to  this  theory,  would  be,  not  some  such 
supernatural  event  as  the  giving  eye¬ 
sight  to  the  blind,  or  raising  the  dead, 
but  to  prove  that  such  an  event  had 
taken  place. 

The  immediate  point  in  dispute,  then, 
is  not  the  possibility  of  a  miracle  being 
wrought  before  the  eyes  of  men,  but,  that 


5* 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


actually  seeing  it,  the  witnesses  should 
be  able  determinately  to  recognise  its 
supernaturalism,  and  find  means  to  in¬ 
form  and  convince  other  cultured,  upright, 
and  judicious  men  of  what  they  had 
seen. 

But  since  the  supernatural  may  occur, 
may  not  this,  also,  occur,  if  even  it  be 
miraculous,  that  men  seeing  the  super¬ 
natural  may  assuredly  recognise  its  occur¬ 
rence,  and  so  attest  it  as  to  satisfy  the 
intellectual  and  moral  conviction  of  impar¬ 
tial  and  competent  inquirers?  This,  how¬ 
ever,  on  the  theory  before  us,  is  the  one  fact 
that  is  denied,  but  happily  this  is  exactly 
the  fact  that  can  be  proved  to  a  demonstra¬ 
tion.  Men  have  so  attested  that  they 
have  witnessed  the  miraculous,  as  to  pro¬ 
duce  the  most  profound  conviction  in  the 
mind  and  heart  of  men  of  every  rank,  age 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


59 


and  condition ;  peasant,  scholar  and 
philosopher.  So  that  this  objection  also 
evaporates  under  analysis. 

“ .  .  .  Circumfusa  repente 

Scindit  se  nubes,  et  in  aethera  purgat  apertum.” 

The  Sceptic  pleads  again  :  “  I  live  for 
the  present  life,  because  I  have  it  and 
enjoy  it ;  but  the  future  life  I  leave  to 
take  care  of  itself,  because  it  is  an 

“  ‘  Undiscovered  country,  from  whose  bourn 
No  traveller  returns.’ 

“A  continuous  stream  of  emigrants 
have  flowed  for  centuries  thitherward ; 
let  one  return  and  tell  us,  at  least,  the 
fact  of  the  existence  of  that  land  that 
is  said  to  lie  beyond  the  sun :  let  one 
come  back  from  the  dead,  and  so  prove 
that  what  we  call  death  is  life  else¬ 
where  ;  and  I  shall  believe  and  live  for 
the  future  life  also.” 


6o 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


We  have  here,  broadly  stated,  a 
current  form  of  objection.  It  is  one 
certainly  that  has  the  merit  of  antiquity. 
Eighteen  centuries  ago  it  found  place 
among  the  “  difficulties  of  belief,”  and 
was  replied  to  by  that  unique  Teacher, 
of  whom  Jean  Paul  Richter  says,  that 
“  being  the  holiest  among  the  mighty, 
and  the  mightiest  among  the  holy,  lifted 
with  His  pierced  hand  empires  off  their 
hinges,  turned  the  stream  of  civilization 
out  of  its  channel,  and  still  governs  the 
ages.”  He  said,  “  If  they  hear  not 
Moses  and  the  prophets,  neither  will  they 
be  persuaded,  though  one  rose  from  the 
dead.”1  And  His  own  subsequent  history 
too  terribly  confirmed  the  truth  of  His 
statement.  The  testimony  of  Apostles 
and  evangelists  has  been  added  to  law- 
1  St.  Luke  xvi.  31. 


I  HE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


61 


givers  and  prophets.  One  has  risen 
from  the  dead,  yet  the  Sceptic  is  not 
persuaded. 

But  he  objects,  “  I  decline  to  accept 
the  evangelical  narrative  of  Christ’s  re¬ 
surrection  from  the  dead  as  a  historic 
fact,  the  evidences  being  insufficient  to 
sustain  the  documents  as  trustworthy 
historic  records.”  This  objection,  how¬ 
ever,  implies,  if  it  is  to  excuse  the 
Sceptic’s  unbelief,  that  he  has  gone 
carefully  into  an  examination  of  the 
varied  and  somewhat  extensive  system 
of  evidences  by  which  these  Christian 
documents  are  authenticated  ;  or  that  he 
has,  at  least,  endeavoured  according  to 
the  best  of  his  ability,  and  with  honest 
impartiality,  to  balance  the  testimony  of 
competent  critics,  who  have  undertaken 
the  learned  labour  of  examining  the 


62 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED . 


historic  value  of  the  Christian  records, 
and  that  he  has  come  to  the  deliberate 
— may  we  not  add,  to  the  regretful ? — 
conclusion,  that  the  Gospel  miracles — 
including  the  supreme  one  of  Christ’s 
resurrection — are  not  sustained  by  ade¬ 
quate  evidence  as  historic  facts  ;  but 
that  they  owe  their  origin  either  to  the 
disordered  imagination  of  Christ’s  first 
disciples  or  that  they  are  the  fanatical 
inventions  of  a  later  age.  But  such 
a  conclusion  as  this,  the  author  of  Ecce 
Homo  truly  says,  “  destroys  the  credi¬ 
bility  of  the  documents  not  partially 
but  wholly,  and  leaves  Christ  a  person¬ 
age  as  mythical  as  Hercules.” 1 

Is  any  fair-minded  and  earnest  Sceptic 
prepared  for  such  a  conclusion,  and 
ready  to  affirm  that  he  has  renounced 
1  Ecce  Homo ,  cap.  5. 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


63 


the  ancient  faith  because  he  has  actually 
discovered,  or  come  to  the  sorrowful 
conclusion,  as  the  result  of  conscientious 
investigation,  that  Christianity  is  founded 
in  falsehood  ;  that  the  Christ  of  history 
is  a  myth,  like  the  ancient  demi-gods, 
or  that  His  historic  reality  being 
granted,  He  must  be  stripped  of  “  the 
gorgeous  robe  ”  of  the  supernatural,  de¬ 
scend  from  the  sublime  elevation  to  which 
the  deluded  faith  and  love  of  eighteen 
centuries  have  raised  Him,  and  take 
rank  with  Plato  and  Aristotle,  Zeno  and 
Seneca,  Confucius  and  Mahomet,  one 
among  other  great  world-teachers,  to  be 
crowned  only,  if  crowned  at  all,  with 
the  “  platted  thorns  ”  of  the  martyr  ? 

Is  this,  then,  conceivably  the  melan¬ 
choly  end  of  the  world’s  noblest  efforts, 
aims,  and  hopes — the  heart-rending  dis- 


64 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


covery  that  the  majestic  fabric  of 
Christendom,  altars,  temples,  literature, 
arts,  and  “  living  stones  ”  (Xidou  ^covres), 
the  cherished  result  of  two  thousand 
years  of  suffering  and  endeavour,  con¬ 
secrated  by  prayer  and  cheered  by  song, 
is  built  upon  a  treacherous  morass  of 
error,  untruth  and  superstition,  and  that 
sooner  or  later  the  resplendent  structure 
must  fall,  leaving  only  the  broken  disorder 
of  a  mighty  ruin,  to  amaze  future  ages 
with  the  noble  work  and  ambitious  pro¬ 
portions  of  that  majestic  edifice  raised  by 
the  credulity  of  mankind  to  the  honour 
of  Jesus  of  Nazareth  ? 

But  the  Sceptic  must  admit,  at  any 
rate,  that  the  enlightened  and  busy  en¬ 
thusiasm  of  Christian  worship,  and 
Christian  work,  foremost  among  the 
beneficent  activities  of  this  eager  age, 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


65 


betray  no  sign  that  the  intellect  or  the 
heart  of  the  world  has  detected  any 
indications  of  insecurity  in  the  founda¬ 
tions  of  the  ancient  faith,  or  of  shaken 
love  and  devotion  to  its  Divine  Founder. 
Even  M.  Renan,  in  his  Vie  de  Jesu ,  says 
of  Christ,  “  a  thousand  times  more  living, 
a  thousand  times  more  loved  since  Thy 
death  than  during  the  days  of  Thy  pil¬ 
grimage  here  below,  Thou  wilt  become 
to  such  a  degree  the  Corner  Stone  of 
humanity,  that  to  tear  Thy  name  from 
this  world  would  be  to  shake  it  to  its 
foundations.”  Theodore  Parker,  too,  de¬ 
spite  his  naturalistic  and  Unitarian  views, 
felt  the  unique  and  everlasting  ascen¬ 
dency  of  Christ,  and  with  a  generous 
candour  he  urged  eloquently  in  his  Life 
of  fesus  the  argument  from  results. 
“  Consider,”  says  he,  “  what  a  work  His 


E 


66 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


words  and  deeds  have  wrought  in  the 
world.  Remember  that  the  greatest  minds 
have  seen  no  farther,  and  added  nothing 
to  His  doctrine  of  religion  ;  that  the  rich¬ 
est  hearts  have  felt  no  deeper,  and  added 
nothing  to  the  sentiment  of  religion  ;  have 
set  no  loftier  aim,  no  truer  method  than 
His  of  perfect  love  to  God  and  man. 
Measure  Him  by  the  shadow  He  has  cast 
into  the  world — no,  by  the  light  He  has 
shed  upon  it.  Shall  we  be  told  such  a 
man  never  lived — the  whole  story  is  a 
lie  ?  Suppose  that  Plato  and  Newton 
never  lived.  But  who  did  their  wonders 
and  thought  their  thoughts  ?  It  takes  a 
Newton  to  forge  a  Newton.  What  man 
could  have  fabricated  Jesus?  None  but 
Jesus.” 

‘The  great  surprise  of  human  history 
was  the  coming  of  Jesus  Christ.  The 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


67 


uniqueness  of  His  Person  is  an  ultimate 
fact  of  Christianity.  Whoever  would 
deny  the  presence  of  the  Divine  power 
in  human  history  must  first  reduce  the 
character  of  Jesus  of  Nazareth  to  the 
level  of  the  possibilities  of  common 
human  nature.  He  is  Himself  the 
greatest  of  His  miracles.  If  by  close 
historical  scrutiny,  or  critical  question¬ 
ing,  we  fail  to  resolve  the  miraculous 
character  of  Jesus  —  the  ultimate  fact  of 
Christianity  —  into  the  common,  known 
elements  of  our  human  nature ;  if  the 
laws  of  heredity  prove  insufficient  to 
explain  His  generation,  then  the  further 
question  will  at  once  arise  whether  there 
may  not  be  other  than  natural  elements 
present  in  human  history,  which  come 
to  their  perfect  power  in  Jesus  of 
Nazareth  ;  whether  we  may  not  find  in 


68 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


the  laws  and  in  the  forces  of  a  super¬ 
natural  evolution  the  sufficient  explana¬ 
tion  of  His  miraculous  Person.  If  the 
appearance  of  Jesus  is  not  natural  in 
comparison  with  other  lives  ;  if  the  Christ 
of  the  Gospel  seems  to  be  a  miraculous 
fact  contrary  to  human  experience,  then, 
before  we  throw  aside  the  historical 
evidences  which  centre  in  the  unique¬ 
ness  of  His  Person,  and  flow  from  the 
originality  of  His  life,  we  are  at  least 
bound  to  inquire  whether  there  may 
not  be  a  broader  view  of  human  history 
and  a  deeper  science  of  the  Creation, 
in  which  we  may  find  revealed  an  un¬ 
suspected  and  larger  naturalness  in  this 
greatest  miracle  of  the  ages  — .  the  per¬ 
sonality  of  Jesus  Christ.”1 

1  Old  Faith  in  New  Light.  Newman  Smyth. 
Cap.  v.  An  admirable  handbook,  well  worthy  of 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


69 


The  miracles,  however — pre-eminently 
the  central  one  of  His  resurrection — are 
essential  elements  in  the  narratives  of  the 
life  and  work  of  Christ  ;  and  an  Apostle, 
himself  a  man  of  noble  intellect  and 
liberal  culture,  rests  the  whole  super¬ 
structure  of  Christianity  upon  Christ’s 
resurrection.  “  If  Christ  be  not  risen, 
then  is  our  preaching  vain,  and  your  faith 
is  also  vain.  Yea,  and  we  are  found  false 
witnesses  of  God  ;  because  we  have  testi¬ 
fied  of  God  that  He  raised  up  Christ.”1 
The  Sceptic,  therefore,  who  refuses  to 

the  Sceptic’s  or  Doubter’s  careful  examination. 
For  a  further  consideration  of  the  subject  of 
Christ’s  unique  place  in  history,  see  The  Christ  of 
History ,  by  Dr.  John  Young  ;  and  specially  the 
masterly  chapter  (x.) — “The  character  of  Jesus 
forbids  His  possible  classification  with  men  ” — in 
Nature  and  the  Supernatural ,  by  Dr.  Horace 
Bushnell. 

1  1  Cor.  xv.  14,  15. 


70 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED 


acknowledge  the  resurrection  of  Christ, 
i.e .  that  “  One  has  come  back  from  the 
dead,”  is  left  to  a  conclusion  lying  within 
the  dark  and  desolate  region  of  irrational 
belief  that  the  Gospel  narratives  are  either 
the  product  of  fanatical  superstition,  or 
a  malicious  conspiracy ;  and  that  the 
whole  edifice  of  Christianity  is  founded 
in  falsehood  and  reared  in  fraud. 

But,  true  or  false,  it  is  beyond  dispute 
that  multitudes  in  the  first  age  of  Chris¬ 
tianity  believed  in  the  resurrection — they 
at  least,  were  convinced  that  “  One  had 
risen  from  the  dead,”  yet  whilst  some 
remained  to  worship,  others  retired  to  per¬ 
secute.  They  “  took  counsel  ”  how  they 
might  destroy  the  testimony.1  Evidence 
of  the  supernatural,  then,  when  actually 
supplied,  was  not  sufficient  to  win  the 
1  S.  Matt,  xxviii.  n,  et  seg. 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


7i 


faith  and  captivate  the  will :  “  they  would 
not  be  persuaded,  though  One  rose  from 
the  dead.”  1 

But  the  doubter  may  object  that  the 
events  are  now  so  remote,  so  obscured 
by  the  mists  of  temporal  distance,  that  he 
cannot  admit  their  reality  or  yield  to 
their  recital.  Yet  surely  he  does  not 
propose  to  confine  his  belief  within  the 
narrow  orbit  of  his  own  personal  obser¬ 
vation,  or  the  contracted  circle  of  the 
present.  “No  ;  not  exactly  that but  he 
urges  again  that  “  Christian  antiquity  is 
too  far  removed  for  us  to  take  security  in 
respect  of  its  surprising  statements.” 

Such  a  proposition  has  two  serious 
defects. 

First ,  it  implies  that  if  we  were  nearer 
by  some  centuries,  more  or  less,  we  should 
1  S.  Luke  xvi.  31. 


72 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED . 


be  better  able  to  test  the  veracity  of  the 
witnesses,  or  the  genuineness  and  authen¬ 
ticity  of  the  documents,  and  at  any  rate 
feel  more  inclined  to  accredit  their  state¬ 
ments.  We  deny  that.  The  theory  fails 
under  a  practical  test.  The  first  century 
as  well  as  the  nineteenth  had  its  doubters 
and  deniers ;  and  every  intervening  age 
has  its  ample  records  of  unbelief. 

Secondly ,  pressed  to  its  logical  result, 
the  objection  lands  us  in  the  absurdity 
already  noted  ;  viz.  that  if  evidence  in 
respect  of  an  event  must  necessarily  grow 
fainter  in  process  of  time,  there  is  inev¬ 
itably  a  vanishing  point  of  distance  from 
the  date  of  its  occurrence,  however  re¬ 
markable,  at  which  it  is  impossible  to 
prove  it. 

Coleridge  thought  that  the  evidences  in 
favour  of  the  main  facts  of  the  Christian 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


73 


faith,  were  an  increasing  quantity  in  his¬ 
tory.  The  sustained  vigour  of  its  vitality, 
its  widening  influence  and  accumulating 
work  is  its  growing  evidence — Christen¬ 
dom  the  proof  of  Christianity. 

The  Sceptic  will  admit  as  beyond  con¬ 
tention  that  millions  of  people  believe 
that  “  One  has  risen  from  the  dead”;  and 
that  whilst  with  a  certain  proportion  of 
these,  this  belief  has  wrought  itself  into 
the  very  fibre  and  tissue  of  their  character, 
and  gives  motive  and  direction  to  their 
life,  that  there  is  yet  another  proportion 
— possibly  the  larger  proportion — of  those 
who  do  not  doubt  the  fact  of  Christ’s 
resurrection,  and  have  no  scruples  as  to 
the  sufficiency  of  the  historic  evidences, 
who  are  yet  unchanged  in  life  and  char¬ 
acter  by  these  acknowledged  events. 

“Precisely,”  retorts  the  Sceptic,  “because 


74 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


these  events  are  too  remote  and  dim  to 
take  a  firm  and  effective  hold  of  the 
imagination,  the  conscience,  and  the  will. 
What  I  want,”  he  continues,  “  is  a  revela¬ 
tion  to  myself,  attested  by  some  super¬ 
natural  manifestation ;  a  life  from  the 
dead  which  shall  prove  to  me  a  life  be¬ 
yond  life,  a  future  life :  or  such  a  fact 
authenticated  to  living  and  trustworthy 
witnesses  ;  then  I  can  accept  the  doctrine, 
and  yield  my  will.”  Be  not  deceived  :  the 
experiment,  as  we  have  seen,  has  been 
well  tried,  and  signally  failed. 

But  let  the  Sceptic  who  asks  for  some 
such  direct  evidence  as  this,  and  his  name 
is  legion,  consider  whether  the  conditions 
on  which  he  is  offering  his  faith  and  con¬ 
viction  are  founded  in  reason. 

It  is  not  one  resurrection  or  return  from 
the  dead,  or  other  such  supernatural  evi- 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


75 


dence,  that  he  asks,  but  thousands  of 
them.  If  they  are  necessary  to  convince 
the  unbeliever,  they  must  appear  in  every 
age,  in  every  locality,  and  to  select  groups 
of  witnesses  ;  but  their  very  frequency,  and 
the  order  of  their  recurrence,  would  super¬ 
induce  the  indifference  that  comes  of 
familiarity.  Events  are  taking  place  con¬ 
stantly,  by  what  is  called  natural  process, 
not  less  wonderful  than  any  “miracle,”  but 
they  cease  to  strike  with  wonder  because 
they  recur  with  regularity. 

But  let  us  hear  the  Sceptic’s  demand 
in  another  form.  “  Give  us,”  he  says,  “  at 
any  rate,  such  evidences  as  will  satisfy 
the  intellectual  requirement — we  ask  for 
logical  proof  T 

On  what  reasonable  ground,  however, 
does  the  Sceptic  demand  proofs  in  respect 


76 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


of  God,  Christ,  and  the  future  life,  that 
shall  satisfy  the  “  pure  reason,”  or  meet 
the  rigid  requirements  of  logical  analysis  ? 
Logic  is  not  our  sole  guide  in  human 
affairs,  nor  do  purely  intellectual  con¬ 
siderations  rule  us  in  the  movements  and 
decisions  of  every-day  life.  Nay,  it  is  the 
lower  and  narrower  rather  than  the  higher 
and  wider  concerns  of  life  that  are  amen¬ 
able  to  intellectual  verification  or  subject 
to  the  conditions  of  logical  investigation. 
Is  it  reasonable,  then,  to  demand  that 
the  Divine  existence  shall  be  proven  by  a 
purely  intellectual  process,  and  the  fact  of 
a  future  life  be  reduced  to  a  syllogism  ? 

As  an  inquirer  in  the  highest  depart¬ 
ment  of  human  investigation,  the  Sceptic 
does  himself  grave  injustice  by  neglecting 
any  of  his  powers,  or  by  shutting  up  in 
durance  any  of  those  sentinel  faculties 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


77 


which  should  keep  keenest  outlook  on 
the  watch-tower  of  life.  Surely  in  this 
supreme  concern  no  capacity  should  be 
idle,  no  sense  asleep ;  but  rather  with 
loins  girt,  and  every  energy  alert,  the 
honest  and  earnest  Sceptic  should  seek 
after  God,  if  haply  he  may  find  Him,  and 
with  sleepless  vigil  he  should  watch  for 
signs  of  a  dawn  that  would  make  eternal 
morning  in  his  sky.  Yet  in  respect  of 
those  questions  that  deal  with  God  and 
the  future  life,  the  Sceptic  asks  for  logical 
proof,  and  evidences  that  shall  command 
the  recognition  of  the  “  pure  reason  ”  ;  as 
though  logic  ought  to  be  his  sole  “guide, 
philosopher  and  friend,”  and  the  con¬ 
clusions  of  the  pure  reason  his  only  satis- 
fying  portion. 

Professor  Tyndall  complains  that  “the 
action  of  the  pure  reason  is  disturbed  by 


7* 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


the  emotions.”  And  why  not  ?  Man  can¬ 
not  live  on  bread  and  logic ;  or  satisfy 
the  activities  and  aspirations  of  his  many- 
sided  life  with  the  exercises  of  “the  pure 
reason.”  The  distinguished  Professor  has 
urged,  with  elaborate  eloquence,  “ The  Uses 
of  the  Imagination  ”  in  the  pursuits  of 
science ;  but  in  inquiries  of  yet  more 
sacred  moment,  are  emotional  energies  to 
be  excluded,  and  moral  faculties  to  have 
no  function?  Impossible.  Human  life 
cannot  attain  its  true  proportions  in  the 
keen,  cold  air  of  “  pure  reason.”  The 
moral  and  emotional  faculties  play  their 
mighty  part  in  the  formation  of  opinion, 
the  moulding  of  character,  and  in  giving 
force  and  aim,  grace  and  colour  to  life : 

“  Nor  can  it  suit  us  to  forget 
The  mighty  hopes  that  make  us  men.” 

Indeed,  Professor  Tyndall  has  himself 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


79 


acknowledged  that  “  religious  feeling  is  as 
much  a  verity  as  any  part  of  human  con¬ 
sciousness,  and  against  it,  on  its  subjective 
side,  the  waves  of  science  beat  in  Vain.”1 
And  again,  in  even  more  suggestive  terms, 
he  says,  “Feeling  appeared  in  the  world 
before  knowledge ;  and  thoughts,  concep¬ 
tions,  and  creeds,  founded  on  emotion, 
had,  before  the  dawn  of  science,  taken 
root  in  man.  Such  thoughts,  conceptions, 
and  creeds  must  have  met  a  deep  and 
general  want,  otherwise  their  growth  could 
not  have  been  so  luxuriant,  nor  their 
abiding  force  so  strong.”2  Precisely  so; 
the  moral  nature  was  quicker  in  its  move¬ 
ment  than  the  intellectual,  the  emotions 
acted  in  advance  of  the  “pure  reason,” 
instinct  and  intuition  were  before  logic ; 

1  Virchow  on  Evolution.  Nineteenth  Century , 
Nov.,  1878.  2  Ibid. 


8o 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED . 


“  before  the  dawn  of  science,”  a  hunger 
of  the  heart  impelled  human  life  to  seek 
after  God. 

It  is  not,  then,  the  contention  of  the 
theologian  alone,  but  the  concession  of 
the  scientist,  that  “  a  deep  and  general 
want  ”  impelled  the  first  prompt  move¬ 
ments  of  human  life  towards  “conceptions 
and  creeds  ”  founded  in  the  emotions. 
But  the  right  use  of  the  emotions  is  a 
proper  exercise  of  the  most  cultured  life, 
according  to  the  scientist  and  Positivist, 
for  even  Mr.  Frederick  Harrison  tells  us 
that  “the  first  of  all  our  duties  is  to  ob¬ 
tain  for  ourselves,  and  procure  for  others, 
a  sound,  complete,  real  education,  an  edu¬ 
cation  not  merely  scientific,  but  moral 
and  emotional.”  1 

1  “  Creed  of  a  Layman.”  Nineteenth  Century , 
Mar.,  1 88 1 . 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


81 


Religion,  then,  meets  a  profound  and 
instinctive  necessity  of  human  life.  Un¬ 
belief  is  not  the  native  air  of  man.  He 
cannot  flourish  in  full  proportions  on  the 
negation  of  God  and  futurity.  He  has 
in  him,  as  constituent  elements,  capacities 
and  desires  that  terminate  only  in  the 
Eternal  and  Divine — a  heart-hunger  for 
a  “  bread  of  life  that  cometh  down  from 
God.”  But  surely  capacity  implies  oppor¬ 
tunity;  appetite,  satisfaction;  function,  use. 
The  exquisite  structural  arrangements  of 
the  organs  of  sight  and  hearing  imply 
vision  and  sound.  The  functions  of  re¬ 
spiration  signify  an  atmosphere.  The 
scientific  naturalist,  disinterring  the  frag¬ 
ments  of  pre-historic  fauna,  infers,  from 
the  structure  of  their  remains,  what  were 
the  elements  in  which  these  living  crea¬ 
tures  existed  and  the  aliment  on  which 


F 


82 


7 HE  SCEPTICS  CREED . 


they  were  nourished.  But  the  psycholo¬ 
gist  finds  faculty  and  potentiality  in  the 
spiritual  nature  of  man ;  and  these  the 
student  of  human  history  discovers,  work¬ 
ing  themselves  out  in  “  strong  ”  and 
“  luxuriant  ”  religious  growths  :  “  concep¬ 
tions  and  creeds,”  the  inborn  life  of  man, 
feeling  after  God,  as  plants  feel  after  light. 
And  is  this  not  human  consciousness  in¬ 
terpreting  its  own  inbred  need:  psychology 
and  history  together  bearing  testimony 
that  man  needs  God  and  the  hopes  of 
religion,  as  plants  need  light  and  animals 
air  ? 1 

Why,  then,  should  the  emotional  ener- 

1  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer  says,  “An  unbiassed 
consideration  .  .  .  forces  us  to  conclude  that 

Religion,  everywhere  present  as  a  weft  running 
through  the  warp  of  human  history,  expresses 
some  eternal  fact.” — First  Principles,  cap.  i.,  “Re¬ 
ligion  and  Science.” 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


83 


gies,  which  were  alert  before  “  the  dawn 
of  science,”  and  that  religious  feeling 
which  appeared  before  knowledge,  be 
“cabin’d,  cribb’d,  confin’d,”  as  “dis¬ 
turbers,”  whilst  the  “  pure  reason  ”  pursues 
in  cold  solitude  those  grave  inquiries 
that  concern  the  very  core  of  life  and  the 
very  mould  of  character  ?  It  is  not  thus 
that  men  act  in  many  of  the  best  and 
most  important  movements  of  life. 

The  scientist  does  not  form  his  friend¬ 
ships  by  efforts  of  the  “  pure  reason  ”  ; 
nor  does  the  Positivist  cement  his  attach¬ 
ments  by  logical  process.  The  affections 
cleave  their  way,  and  reach  some  of  their 
noblest  conclusions,  without  the  aid  of 
science  or  the  succour  of  logic.  The 
emotions  are  the  helpmeet  of  the  intellect 
in  laying  hold  of  those  thoughts  and 
hopes  of  religion  that  purify  character 


84 


THE  SCEPTIC’S  CREED. 


and  ennoble  life.  The  heart  that  hungers 
for  God  may  justly  claim  to  take  its 
place  and  part  in  seeking  for  the  grand 
object  of  its  desire. 

But  the  inner  sense  which  yearns  for 
the  deeper  springs,  the  emotional  aspira¬ 
tions  which  feel  the  want  of  “  more  life, 
and  fuller,”  may  surely  aid  the  intellect 
in  its  search  for  the  fount  of  immortality. 
It  was  one  of  the  great  masters  of  spiritual 
instruction  who  said,  “With  the  heart 
man  believeth  unto  righteousness  ;  ” 1  and, 
with  a  profound  insight  both  in  respect 
of  the  proportions  of  religion  and  the 
necessities  of  man,  addressing  the  first 
European  disciples  of  Christianity,  he 
urged  the'  necessity  for  the  growth  of  the 
vital  principle  of  religion,  not  only  by  the 
exercises  of  the  intellect,  but  in  quickened 


1  Rom.  x.  io. 


THE  SCEPTIC’S  CREED. 


85 


perceptions  by  the  internal  sense — “  in 
full  knowledge  and  in  active  emotion  ” — 
eV  eiri^vcoaei  /cal  rraay  aicrdtjcrei.1 

There  is,  indeed,  no  infallibility  in  the 
action  of  religious  feeling  any  more  than 
in  that  of  intellectual  effort.  Either  may 
be  betrayed  ;  but  even  Professor  Huxley 
confesses  that  “  religious  feeling  is  the 
essential  basis  of  conduct;”  nay,  he  adds 
further, — and  we  welcome  his  notable  ad¬ 
mission, — that  he  is  “at  a  loss  to  know 
how  it  is  to  be  kept  up  without  the  use 
of  the  Bible.” 2  Truly  the  need  of  au¬ 
thoritative  guidance  in  matters  pertaining 
to  the  spiritual  life  is  manifest ;  but  in 
ascertaining  that  guidance  and  verifying 
its  authority,  there  is  as  certainly  legiti¬ 
mate  scope  and  exercise  for  the  emotional 
as  for  the  intellectual  functions.  And  in 
1  Phil.  i.  9.  2  Vide  infra ,  pp.  163  5. 


85 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


controverting  a  Sceptic’s  creed  of  “  Life 
for  the  present,  unrestrained  by  considera¬ 
tions  of  %  life  in  the  future,”  as  a  creed 
logically  untenable  and  morally  degrading 
I  have  for  the  occasion  urged  only  those 
central  verities  of  the  Christian  faith 
which  confessedly  exalt  the  thought, 
purify  the  affections,  and  give  dignity  to 
human  life.  Against  these  science  has 
no  record,  and  advanced  thought  no  plea. 

Professor  Huxley  says,  “The  love  of 
moral  beauty  struggling  through  a  world 
full  of  sorrow  and  sin  is  surely  as  much 
stronger  for  believing  that  sooner  or  later 
a  vision  of  perfect  peace  and  goodness 
will  burst  upon  him,  as  the  toiler  up  a 
mountain  for  the  belief  that  beyond  crag 
and  snow  lies  home  and  rest.”1  And  Pro- 

.s 

1  “  A  Modern  Symposium.”  Nineteenth  Century, 
May,  1877. 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


*1 


fessor  Clifford  admitted  that  “  belief  in  God 
and  a  future  life  is  a  source  of  refined 
and  elevated  pleasure  to  those  who  can 
hold  it.”  1  Confessedly,  then,  faith  in  God, 
and  the  anticipations  of  life  and  im¬ 
mortality,  adorn  and  enrich  life,  imparting 
to  it  vigour,  courage  and  content  ;  so 
that  it  is  more  patient  under  burthens, 
calmer  in  peril,  scaling  the  heights  of 

1  “A  Modern  Symposium.”  Nineteenth  Century , 
May,  1877. 

“  To  believe  in  an  ever-living  and  perfect  Mind, 
supreme  over  the  universe,  is  to  invest  moral  dis¬ 
tinctions  with  immensity  and  eternity,  and  lift 
them  from  the  provincial  stage  of  human  society 
to  the  imperishable  theatre  of  all  being.  When 
planted  thus  in  the  very  substance  of  things,  they 
justify  and  support  the  ideal  estimates  of  the 
conscience  ;  they  deepen  every  guilty  shame  ; 
they  guarantee  every  righteous  hope  ;  and  they 
help  the  will  with  a  Divine  casting-vote  in  every 
balance  of  temptation.” — Vide  Martineau  in  the 
same  Symposium. 


88 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


enterprise  and  effort  with  a  surer  footstep 
and  a  cheerier  heart. 

But  far  be  it,  assuredly,  from  science 
or  philosophy  to  admit  that  such  practical 
and  ’  beneficial  results  are  to  be  obtained 
by  beguiling  human  life  into  the  accept¬ 
ance  of  some  cunning  potion  of  super¬ 
stition,  or  philtre  of  theological  alchemy, 
alien  to  the  true  nature  and  need  of  man. 
Human  life  can  only  be  nourished  into 
more  refined  and  elevated  vigour  by 
supplying  it  with  that  wholesome  aliment 
that  is  suited  to  its  constitutional  neces¬ 
sities.  Physical  life  is  not  invigorated  by 
a  regimen  alien  from  its  natural  require¬ 
ments.  And  in  the  nature  of  things  it 
is  impossible  that  the  higher  life  of  man 
can  ripen  in  force,  comeliness  and  joy 
upon  a  diet  of  “cunningly  devised  fables, ” 
mystic  fancies,  or  night-born  superstitions. 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED . 


89 


The  effect  upon  a  human  ' soul  of  living 
faith  in  God,  Christ,  and  immortality 
evinces  the  deep  necessities  in  man  and 
the  essential  fitness  of  such  “  elements 
of  life  and  thought  ”  to  satisfy  his  need 
and  invigorate  his  being.  “  Cor  hu- 
manum  inquietum  est,  donee  requiescat 
in  Deo.” 

And  where  besides  can  man  find  his 
satisfying  portion  ?  The  inadequacy  of 
ethics,  science,  or  culture  to  give  peace 
and  content  to  the  deep  and  ever-widen¬ 
ing  needs  of  human  life  has  been  freely 
conceded  by  scientist  and  Positivist ;  and 
religion  is  admitted  to  be  necessary  to 
the  progress  of  civilization  and  the  evo¬ 
lution  of  society. 

Mr.  Herbert  Spencer  censures  the  “  bias 
that  undervalues  religious  systems,”  and 
adds,  “  a  religious  system  is  a  normal 


90 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


and  essential  factor  in  every  evolving 
society.”1 2  Mr.  Frederick  Harrison  ac¬ 
tually  affirms  that  “  those  who  teach 
that  the  future  can  be  built  upon 
science  and  civilization  are  attempting 
to  build  a  pyramid  of  bricks  without 
straw.”  And,  further,  he  admits  that 
“  morals  are  not  adequate  to  direct  human 
life  until  they  are  transfused  into  that 
sense  of  resignation,  adoration,  and  com¬ 
munion  with  an  over-ruling  Providence, 
which  is  the  true  mark  of  religion.” 3  In 
another  paper  the  same  writer  has  said, 
“  It  is  mockery  to  talk  about  science, 
enlightenment,  progress,  freethought,  to 
the  myriads  of  men  and  women,  and  to 
tell  them  that  these  ought  to  serve  them. 

1  The  Study  of  Sociology .  Cap.  xii. 

2  “  Modern  Symposium.”  Nineteenth  Century 

April,  1877. 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


9i 


What  can  they  want  more — why  ask  for 
religion  ?  The  rude  men  who  sweat  and 
swelter  in  mines,  in  furnaces,  in  factories,  the 
hedger  and  the  ditcher,  and  the  cottager, 
with  his  pinched  home,  the  women  who 
stitch  and  serve,  the  children  wandering 
forlorn  and  unkempt  into  rough  life, — 
how  are  these  to  be  sustained  and  com¬ 
forted  by  science  and  enlightenment  ? 
How  will  freethought  teach  discipline  to 
the  young  and  self-restraint  to  the  wild  ? 
What  sustenance  will  the  imagination 
and  the  devotional  nature  receive  from 
the  principle  of  free  inquiry?  Human 
nature  is  not  a  thing  so  docile  and  in¬ 
tellectual  that  it  can  be  tamed  by  fine 
thoughts,  nor  is  society  amenable  to  pure 
ideas.”1  Voltaire  said,  “  Not  to  believe  in 

1  “  Creed  of  a  Layman.”  Nineteenth  Century , 
March,  1881. 


92 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


any  God  would  be  an  error  incompatible 
with  wise  government.”  1 

Religion,  then,  is  necessary  to  the  pro¬ 
gress  of  civilization,  the  advancement  of 
society,  the  joy  of  life,  and  the  security  of 
good  government ;  and  that,  too,  a  religion 
which  finds  its  strength  and  solace,  its 
rapture  and  triumph,  in  faith  in  an  Infinite 
Goodness  and  the  hope  of  the  future  life. 
For  Mr.  Harrison  says  again,  “  How  often 
has  the  overburdened  spirit  felt  peace 
amid  agony  and  bereavement  ;  how  often 
have  the  dying  lips  smiled  in  peace  ; 
what  trust  and  calm  have  beamed  in  the 
eyes  of  the  weakest,  the  most  afflicted, 
the  most  forsaken  ?  We  know  it  all. 
We,  too,  have  felt  all  these  things.  We 
are  not  cynics,  swinishly  deaf  to  the 

1  Life  of  Voltaire.  By  J.  Morley.  “  Religion,” 
cap.  v. 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED . 


93 


spiritual  voices.  Why  ask  us  if  we  have 
any  such  thing  in  our  faith,  if  we  can 
give  these  seraphic  raptures,  these  super¬ 
human  joys  and  hopes  ?  Certainly  not. 
It  is  quite  possible  that  no  rational 
faith  whatever  has  any  exact  equivalent 
to  those  miracles  in  subduing  sense,  and 
galvanising  certain  chords  of  emotion  ”  1 

No ;  Positivist,  scientist,  and  rationalist 
are  constrained  to  concede  that  their 
systems  cannot  touch  the  deeper  spring  of 
being,  thrill  life’s  inmost  fibres  with  a 
rapturous  joy,  and  brighten  dying  eyes 
with  the  dawn  of  a  lovelier  day.  For 
these  Divine  triumphs  we  must  turn  to 
a  religion  that  reveals  Fatherhood,  re¬ 
conciliation,  and  eternal  life. 

John  Stuart  Mill  says,  “  If  religion,  or 

1  “  Creed  of  a  Layman.”  Nineteenth  Century , 
March,  1881. 


94 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


any  particular  form  of  it,  is  true,  its  use¬ 
fulness  follows  without  other  proof.”  But 
is  this  statement  not  to  a  certain  degree 
convertible  ?  If  religion  demonstrates  its 
“  usefulness  ”  by  purifying,  ennobling  and  . 
enriching  life — making  it  stronger  to 
endure  and  do,  awaking  otherwise  un¬ 
stirred  sensibilities  of  exalted  emotion, 
and  evoking  the  highest  energies  of  enter¬ 
prise  and  hope — does  not  its  general  truth 
follow  from  these  results  ? 

Mill  admits  that  “  some  of  the  precepts 
of  Christ  as  exhibited  in  the  Gospels  .  .  . 
carry  some  kinds  of  moral  goodness  to 
a  greater  height  than  had  ever  been 
attained  before.”  He  says  that  re¬ 
ligion,  like  poetry,  supplies  “  ideal  con¬ 
ceptions  grander  and  more  beautiful  than 

M- 

we  see  realized  in  the  prose  of  human 
life.” 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


95 


Again,  “  So  long  as  human  life  is  in¬ 
sufficient  to  satisfy  human  aspirations,  so 
long  there  will  be  a  craving  for  higher 
things,  which  finds  its  most  obvious  satis¬ 
faction  in  religion.  So  long  as  earthly 
life  is  full  of  suffering,  so  long  there  will 
be  need  of  consolations,  which  the  hope 
of  heaven  affords  to  the  selfish,  the  love 
of  God  to  the  tender  and  grateful.  The 
value,  therefore,  of  religion  to  the  in¬ 
dividual,  both  in  the  past  and  present, 
as  a  source  of  personal  satisfaction  and 
of  elevated  feelings,  is  not  to  be  dis¬ 
puted.”  And  one  further  notable  and 
deeply  pathetic  concession  Mill  makes — 
evidently  the  still  small  voice  of  some 
tender  memory.  He  grants  that  “  the 
Sceptic  by  his  scepticism  loses  one 
valuable  consolation,”  if  only  one  :  “  the 
hope  of  reunion  with  those  dear  to  him 


96 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


who  have  ended  their  earthly  life  before 
him.  That  loss  indeed  is  neither  to  be 
denied  nor  extenuated.  In  many  cases 
it  is  beyond  the  reach  of  comparison  or 
estimate.”  1 

But  a  religion  exercising  such  power 
over  human  life,  bestowing  such  gifts  of 
holy  joy,  and  attended  by  such  noble  re¬ 
sults — in  short,  the  complement  of  man’s 
necessity — must  be  founded  in  truth. 
Falsehood  cannot  be  a  gospel  of  peace, 
strength,  and  joy  to  the  toiling,  suffering, 
sinning,  dying  multitudes.  Untruth  can¬ 
not  be  a  necessary  or  secure  basis  on 
which  to  build  wider  and  higher  the  noble 
superstructure  of  civilization.  Supersti¬ 
tion  is  a  treacherous  morass,  not  a  firm 

highway  for  the  advancing  footsteps  of 

10- 

1  Three  Essays  o?i  Religion.  No.  2,  “  Utility  of 
Religion.” 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


97 


human  society.  “  Man/'  said  Carlyle, 
“  is  everywhere  the  born  enemy  of  lies.” 

Let  us  advance  another  step  in  our 
argument,  aided  by  a  further  concession 
from  a  distinguished  quarter. 

Professor  Huxley  says,  “  If  it  is  de¬ 
monstrated  that  the  theological  dogma  is 
needful  to  the  higher  life  of  man,  then 
he  asks  for  proof  of  the  dogma.”  But  is 
the  necessity  not  “proof”?  He  adds, 
“  If  this  proof  is  forthcoming,  it  is  my 

v 

conviction  that  no  drowning  sailor  ever 
clutched  a  hen-coop  more  tenaciously  than 
mankind  will  hold  to  such  dogma,  what¬ 
ever  it  may  be.  But  if  not,  then  I  verily 
believe  that  the  human  race  will  go  on 
its  evil  way.”  1 

1  M  Modern  Symposium.”  Nineteenth  Century , 
May,  5877. 

* 

G 


98 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


Proceeding  from  such  a  quarter  this  is 
a  very  remarkable  statement.  Let  us  ex¬ 
amine  it.  First  from  a  scientist’s  point  of 
view,  it  is  confessed  that  something  has 
gone  radically  wrong  in  human  nature  : 
it  is  going  on  “an  evil  way.”  But  the 
seasons  are  not  going  on  an  evil  way ; 
day  and  night  are  not  in  confusion  ;  the 
forces  of  the  material  world  keep  the  laws 
and  do  their  duty  without  reproach. 
What  has  science  then  to  say  in  respect  of 
this  phenomenon  of  disorder  in  the  moral 
world — that  whilst  nature  in  its  lower 
sphere  goes  on  the  good  way  of  order 
and  regularity  in  admirable  fulfilment  of 
law,  there  has  stolen  into  the  higher 
nature  of  humanity  the  avo/ita — lawless¬ 
ness,  “  confusion  and  every  evil  work  ”  ? 

The  fact  of  moral  disorder,  that  Chris¬ 
tianity  so  strenuously  urges,  the  Professor 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


99 


here  admits,  but,  alas!  he  can  only  “fear” 
that  if  “  the  dogma  ”  cannot  be  proved, 
the  acknowledged  mischief  must  go 
on. 

Then  science,  at  least,  has  no  gospel 
for  this  acknowledged  moral  and  social 
disorder.  This  is  sad  enough ;  but  our 
scientist  further  represents  the  human  race 
as  a  “  drowning  sailor,”  eager,  in  his 
misery,  to  clutch  at  any  flotsam.  Then,  in 
this  view,  humanity  is  “at  sea,”  wrecked 
too  ;  buffeted  by  waves  against  which  it 
has  no  force  adequate  to  contend,  and 
must  sink  unless  it  finds  an  extraneous 
deliverance.  But  this  is  a  very  ground¬ 
work  of  Christian  doctrine  ;  an  elemen¬ 
tary  principle  of  the  faith.  Consenting 
to  this,  science  concedes  half  the  “dogma” 
— human  nature  wrecked  and  ruined. 

A  drowning  sailor,  however,  with  evi- 


100 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


dence  enough  in  his  desperate  need,  does 
not  wait  for  “logical  proof”  of  the  suffi¬ 
cient  buoyancy  of  the  “  hen-coop,”  but 
hopefully  clutches  at  it — “drowning  men 
catch  even  at  straws  ” — like  those  seamen 
and  prisoners,  in  a  famous  shipwreck  off 
the  coast  of  Melita,  who  seized  what  the 
perilous  occasion  offered,  and  “  some  on 
boards  and  some  on  broken  pieces  of 
the  ship  .  .  .  escaped  all  safe  to 

land.”1  Is  it  not  simply  reasonable,  there¬ 
fore,  for  the  Sceptic  to  prove  the  Chris¬ 
tian  “  dogma  ”  by  trying  it  ? 

But  it  is  no  broken  fragment,  a  waif 
on  the  waves  of  time,  some  hap-hazard 
deliverance.  It  is  a  life-line  thrown  by  a 
strong  yet  gentle  hand  to  wrecked  and 

struggling  souls ;  and  from  the  shores 

#• 

rises  a  great  shout  of  thousands  of  al- 

Acts  xxvii.  44. 


i 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


IOI 


ready  rescued  men,  to  the  “  drowning 
sailors,”  to  trust  and  try  the  life-line ; 
and  myriads  more  that  have  gone  for 
ever  from  the  perilous  coasts  of  time, 
having  passed  inland,  away  from  gloom 
and  tempest,  have  left  their  testimony 
behind  that  that  life-line  is  “  mighty  to 
save,”  “even  to  the  uttermost.”  “  Try  it,” 
said  that  profound  student  of  human  life, 
Samuel  Taylor  Coleridge.  “Try  it.  It 
has  been  eighteen  hundred  years  in  exist¬ 
ence,  and  has  one  individual  left  a 
record  like  the  following?  ...  I  have 
given  Christianity  a  fair  trial.  I  was 
aware  that  its  promises  were  made  only 
conditionally.  But  my  heart  bears  me 
witness,  that  to  the  utmost  of  my  power, 
I  have  complied  with  these  conditions. 
Both  outwardly  and  in  the  discipline  of 
my  inward  acts  and  affections,  I  have 


102 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


performed  the  duties  which  it  enjoins, 
and  I  have  used  the  means  which  it  pre¬ 
scribes.  Yet  my  assurance  of  its  truth 
has  received  no  increase.  Its  promises 
have  not  been  fulfilled  ;  and  I  repent  me 
of  my  delusion.  If  neither  your  own 
experience  nor  the  history  of  almost 
two  thousand  years  has  presented  a  single 
testimony  to  this  purport  ;  and  if  you 
have  read  and  heard  of  many  who  have 
lived  and  died  bearing  witness  to  the 
contrary ;  and  if  you  yourself  have  met 
with  some  one ,  in  whom  on  any  other 
point  you  would  place  unqualified  trust, 
who  has  on  his  own  experience  made 
report  to  you  that  ‘  He  is  faithful  who 
promised,  and  what  He  promised  He  has 
proved  Himself  able  to  perform  ’ :  is  it 
bigotry  if  I  fear  that  the  Unbelief,  which 
prejudges  and  prevents  the  experiment, 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


103 


has  its  source  elsewhere  than  in  the  un¬ 
corrupted  judgment  ;  that  not  the  strong, 
free  mind,  but  the  enslaved  will,  is  the 
true  original  infidel  in  this  instance?”1 

But  Christianity  should  be  tried,  if 
tried  at  all,  according  to  its  own  pre¬ 
scribed  methods.  It  is  no  honest  test 
that  disregards  the  conditions  distinctly 
set  down  as  necessary  in  order  to  con¬ 
duct  the  experiment  successfully. 

Dr.  Tyndall,  in  a  remarkable  paper  on 
“Spontaneous  Generation,”  has  given  an 
account  of  a  series  of  experiments  and 
their  conclusive  results.  And  it  is  com¬ 
petent  to  any  other  scientific  inquirer 
to  demonstrate  the  same  conclusions  ;  but 
he  must  be  willing  to  conduct  his  experi¬ 
ment  with  like  labour,  patience  and  ac¬ 
curacy  of  observation.  If,  however,  he 
1  Aids  to  Reflection ,  Aphor.  civ. 


104 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


permits  defects  in  his  apparatus,  impa¬ 
tience  or  inexactness  in  his  own  obser¬ 
vations,  he  will  fail  in  his  results  ;  but 
he  will  have  no  right  to  impugn  Dr.  Tyn¬ 
dall’s  conclusion,  till  he  has  accurately 
followed  his  experiment.  Now  the 
Founder  of  Christianity  said,  “  If  any 
man  willeth  to  do  His  will — lav  rt?  6e\y 
to  6e\7jfjLa  avrov  iroielv — he  shall  know 
of  the  doctrine  ” 1  He  demands,  then, 
“  the  willing  mind,”  the  friendly  dispo¬ 
sition  ;  the  experiment  of  docile  obedi¬ 
ence.  Prejudice  and  hostile  preconcep¬ 
tions  are  obstructive  elements  to  the 
ingress  of  spiritual  light  and  moral  con¬ 
viction.  The  perceptions  must  be  clari¬ 
fied  by  the  sympathetic  will  : — 

“  .  .  .  Then  purg’d  with  euphrasy  and  rue 

The  visual  nerve  ” 


1  S.  John  vii.  17. 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


105 


shall  have  revelations  bright,  definite 
and  clear,  reaching 

“Even  to  the  inmost  seat  of  mental  sight.” 

The  spirit,  however,  that  is  always 
ready  to  fling  its  gibe  at  “  the  faith  of  our 
fathers,”  that  hails  with  delight  every  new 
objection  to  Christianity  that  glides  over 
the  currents  of  human  opinion,  that  is 
eaeer  to  shake  hands  with  the  latest  adif- 
culty  of  belief”;  the  heart  that  is  at  war 
with  good,  or  the  life  that  is  simply  too 
busy  with  self  and  time — the  things  seen 
that  are  temporal — to  engage  in  any 
whole-hearted  search  after  God,  or  too 
impatient  of  control  to  bear  the  restraints 
of  religion,  is  in  no  fitting  mood  to  try 
fairly  the  Christian  experiment ;  and  is 
assuredly  as  little  entitled  to  pass  judg¬ 
ment  on  the  grave  issues  involved  as  the 


io6 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


careless  and  prejudiced  experimentalist 
would  be  warranted  in  denying  the  results 
of  Dr.  Tyndall’s  elaborate  experiments  in 
respect  of  “  spontaneous  generation.” 

The  Christian  has  satisfied  himself  by 
experiment  that  the  results  promised  are 
attainable :  to  him  belong  the  forces  of 
inward  conviction  ;  but  if  the  Sceptic 
will  not  prosecute  the  inquiry,  he  must 
not  deny  the  conclusion.  He  may  say, 
“  I  decline  to  make  the  experiment.” 
But  if  so — why?  Either  because  he  is 
not  anxious  in  respect  of  the  question, 
or  he  is  unwilling  to  reach  the  foretold 
conclusion.  But  this  indifference  or  un¬ 
willingness  “  makes  his  judgment  blind” 
on  the  whole  question,  and  discovers  at 
work  within  himself  causes  that  may, 
at  least  as  probably,  be  the  secret  of 
his  unbelief,  as  any  presumed  inadequacy 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


107 


of  Christian  evidences.  The  earnest 
Sceptic  is  bound  to  adopt  the  test  of 
practical  experiment ;  and  until  he  has 
so  carefully  prosecuted  the  grave  inquiry, 
he  is  bound  to  preserve  a  respectful 
silence  on  the  question. 

I  imagine  that  I  hear  the  Sceptic- 
murmur  of  reply,  “  We  fear  to  believe  in 
the  Unseen,  to  trust  the  Unknown ;  we 
want  some  evidential  facts  that  will  hush 
intellectual  cavil ;  we  want  a  feeling  of 
certainty  : 

<<(  Could  we  but  know 

The  land  that  ends  our  dark  uncertain  travel, 
Where  lie  those  happier  hills  and  meadows 
low, — 

Ah,  if  beyond  the  spirit’s  inmost  cavil, 

Aught  of  that  country  could  we  surely  know, 
Who  would  not  go  ? 

“ ‘  Might  we  but  hear 

The  hovering  angels’  high  imagined  chorus, 

Or  catch,  betimes,  with  wakeful  eyes  and  clear 


io8 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


One  radiant  vista  of  the  realm  before  us, — 

With  one  rapt  moment  given  to  see  and  hear, 

Ah,  who  would  fear  ? 

Were  we  quite  sure 

To  find  the  peerless  friend  who  left  us  lonely, 

Or  there  by  some  celestial  stream  as  pure, 

To  gaze  in  eyes  that  here  were  love-lit  only, — 

This  weary  mortal  coil,  were  we  quite  sure, 

Who  would  endure  ?  '  ” 

Yes,  and  that  knowledge,  by  an  inward 
sense,  we  say  is  attainable,  a  confidence 
that  casts  out  fear,  an  assurance  that 
“calms  the  spirit’s  inmost  cavil”;  but 
there  must  be  first  a  willingness  to  do 
His  will.  As  the  “drowning  sailor” 
struggles  with  desperate  endeavour  to 
“clutch  the  hen-coop,”  so  the  Sceptic  in 
earnest  to  find  deliverance  and  sure 
rescue  must  “  lay  hold  upon  the  hope 
set  before  him  ...  an  anchor  of 
the  soul  both  sure  and  steadfast.”1 

1  Heb.  vi.  18,  19. 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED . 


109 


“There  is  but  one  chance  of  life,”  says 
Professor  Ruskin,  “  in  admitting  so  far 
the  possibility  of  the  Christian  verity, 
as  to  try  it  on  its  own  terms.  There  is 
not  the  slightest  possibility  of  finding 
whether  it  be  true  or  not  first.  ‘  Show 
me  a  sign  first,  and  I  will  come,’  you 
say.  ‘No,’  answers  God, ‘come  first,  and 
then  you  shall  see  a  sign.’  ”  1 

The  Sceptic,  however,  is  not  required 
to  adopt  a  faith  unsustained  by  outward 
evidence.  There  are  external,  internal, 
and  collateral  evidences  in  ample  and 
varied  abundance  to  command  and  con¬ 
firm  the  Christian  faith.  Possibly,  he 
may  reply,  “  I  cannot  accept  these 
evidences '  as  sufficient  to  authenticate 

1  An  Oxford  Lecture.  Nineteenth  Century ,  Jan., 
1878. 


I  IO 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED . 


the  Divine  origin  and  historic  truth  of 
Christianity.” 

But  has  such  an  objector  ever  fairly 
examined  these  evidences,  and  weighed 
them  in  impartial  balances  ?  They 
satisfied  the  philosophic  insight,  the  acute 
research,  the  ample  learning,  the  keen 
cross-examination  of  the  great  apologists 
of  Christianity.  Augustine  and  Anselm, 
Pascal  and  Grotius,  Newton  and  Locke, 
Watson  and  Paley,  and  many  others, 
down  to  this  latest  time,  not  inferior  to 
any  Sceptic  in  masculine  vigour  of  thought, 
extent  of  learning,  or  earnestness  of 
inquiry,  have  recognised  the  irrefutable 
force  of  the  Christian  argument,  and  have 
yielded  their  homage  to  its  authority. 

This  is  not  the  place  to  examine  or  even 

■ 

to  -state  the  Christian  evidences  ;  but 
the  fact  of  their  thorough  acceptance  by 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED.  iii 

men  of  the  highest  probity,  keenest 
intellect,  and  ripest  culture,  lends,  at  least, 
a  high  degree  of  probability 1  to  their 
strength  and  sufficiency,  and  proves,  at 
any  rate,  that  they  are  worthy  of  the 
most  careful  and  respectful  considera¬ 
tion  by  the  earnest-minded  Sceptic. 
They  cannot  be  ignored  by  any  honest 
inquirer. 

A  further  “difficulty  of  belief”  is 
suggested  by  the  Sceptic ;  viz.  that  “  the 
Christian  religion  involves  inexplicable 
mysteries But  mysteries  shadow  life 
on  every  side.  “  Now  men  see  not  the 
bright  light  that  is  in  the  clouds.” 2 
The  disciples  of  physical  science,  as  well 
as  the  disciples  of  Christianity,  are  con¬ 
fronted  with  the  incomprehensible  and 

«• 

1  Vide  supra,  pp.  24-28. 

2  Job  xxxvii.  21. 


1 12 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


the  mysterious.  Professor  Tyndall  says 
that  having  “  exhausted  physics  and 
reached  its  very  rim,  the  mighty  mystery 
still  looms  beyond  us.  I  have,  in  fact, 
made  no  step  towards  its  solution ;  ” 
and,  again,  he  speaks  of  being  in  the 
presence  of  “  two  Incomprehensibles  in¬ 
stead  of  one  Incomprehensible.”  1  Pro¬ 
fessor  Huxley  says :  “  From  the  region 
of  disorderly  mystery,  which  is  the 
domain  of  ignorance,  another  vast  pro¬ 
vince  has  been  added  to  science,  the 
region  of  orderly  mystery.” 2  And  Mr. 
Geo.  H.  Lewes  said,  concerning  the 
problems  of  psychology,  “Those  mys¬ 
teries  will  most  probably  remain  for  ever 
unsolved.” 3  “A  Science  without  mys- 

1  Nineteenth  Century ,  Nov.,  1878. 

2  Quoted  by  Lewes,  Physiology  of  Common  Life, 

vol.  ii.  c.  8.  3  Ibid. 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED.  113 

tery  is  unknown  ;  a  Religion  without 
mystery  is  absurd.” 1  The  scientist, 
then,  and  the  psychologist  bear  testimony 
to  the  presence  of  mystery  both  in 
material  phenomena  and  in  the  laws 
of  mind.  Indeed,  life  itself  is  a  mystery. 

What  is  life  ?  No  man  has  grasped, 
or  even  seen,  the  subtle  entity.  Hinting 
in  a  throb,  a  movement,  a  perfume,  the 
nearness  of  its  hiding-place  ;  yet  it 
mocks  the  seeker.  It  evades  the  edge 
of  the  keenest  scalpel.  Across  the  field 
of  the  microscope  it  flutters  a  fringe  of 
its  delicate  robe,  but  no  eye  has  ever 
caught  a  glimpse  of  the  unveiled  mys¬ 
tery.  The  eager  scientist  admits  that 
“  it  trembles  all  along  the  line  ”  of  his 
research,  yet  it  ever  eludes  his  approach; 

1  Natural  Law  in  the  Spiritual  World ,  p.  48. 
Vide  also  cap.  “  Biogenesis,”  pp.  91,  92. 


H 


1 14  THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 

like  that  fabled  chalice,  that  lies  where 
the  rainbow  touches  the  earth,  but  as 
the  seeker  advances  the  phantom  arch 
recedes.  So  the  mystery  life  evades  the 
keenest  inquisitor. 

But  if  the  physical  universe  involves 
the  incomprehensible,  and  life  itself  is  a 
mystery,  with  what  reason  does  the 
Sceptic  stagger  at  religion  because  of 
its  mysteries,  or  reject  Christian  dogma 
because  it  propounds  the  incomprehen¬ 
sible  ? 

The  ostrich,  when  hard  pressed  with 
pursuit,  is  said  to  thrust  its  head  into 
the  sand  or  bush,  and  thenceforth  sees 
no  danger;  but  the  intelligent  Sceptic 
does  not  imagine  that  by  thrusting  his 
head — where  his  heart  cannot  follow— 
into  a  creed  without  God,  Christ,  or 
immortality,  that  he  has  got  rid  of  mys- 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED.  1 1 5 

teries,  and  settled  all  “  difficulties  of 
belief,”  save  indeed  as  the  ostrich  has 
settled  its  danger  by  refusing  to  see  it. 

What  has  the  Sceptic  to  say  in  re¬ 
spect  of  his  own  being  or  origin  —  with 
a  physical  structure  “fearfully  and 
wonderfully  made,”  with  a  mental  and 
moral  organization  that  enables  him  to 
reason  and  resolve,  to  conceive  an 
Infinite  Benevolence,  and  to  anticipate 
immortal  life,  and  with  a  profound 
homage  to  love  the  one  and  with  joyful 

hope  to  expect  the  other.  What  has 

* 

the  Sceptic  to  say  in  respect  of  the 
origin  of  this  complex  personality — him¬ 
self?  He  will  not,  in  the  face  of  the 
highest  hdentific  opinion,  say  that  he 
is  the  result  of  “spontaneous  genera¬ 
tion,”  that  he  is  “  evolved  from  proto¬ 
plasm  ”  or  “  an  outcome  of  organization  ” 


1 16  THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 

The  phrases  are  familiar,  yet  every  one 
of  them  is  controverted  by  the  latest 
science. 

“  Men  of  science,”  said  Professor 
Tyndall  in  his  Belfast  address,  “  will 
frankly  admit  their  inability  to  point  to 
any  satisfactory  experimental  proof  that 
life  can  be  developed  save  from  demon¬ 
strable  antecedent  life.”  Professor  Huxley 
acknowledges  that  “  life  precedes  organi¬ 
zation  ;”  but  the  effect  cannot  precede 
the  cause  ;  life,  therefore,  is  not  a  result 
of  organization.  The  Sceptic  will  scarcely, 
we  presume,  accept  the  odd  theory  of  a 
scientific  speculator,  who  surmises  that 
“  the  first  forms  of  life  were  carried  from 
some  other  planet  to  this  earth  on  an 
— aerolite  !”  Even  that  fanciful  invention 
does  not  remove  but  only  thrusts  back 
the  difficulty  of  the  origin  of  life  one 


THE  SCEPTIC’S  CREED .  117 

stage.  Or  will  the  Sceptic  trace  his 
ancestry  to  the  monera  of  the  deep-sea 
slime,  where  “  the  oldest  monera  origin¬ 
ated,”  as  Haeckel  says,  “just  as  crystals 
form  in  the  matrix?”1 

The  fact  is,  there  is  no  scientific  con¬ 
firmation  by  experiment  of  the  theory 
of  “spontaneous  generation.”  Haeckel 
even  admits  that  “  the  theory  of  spon¬ 
taneous  generation  cannot  be  experi¬ 
mentally  proved  unless  great  difficulties 
be  overcome.”  Then  he  candidly  adds, 
that  “  he  who  does  not  assume  a  spon¬ 
taneous  generation  of  monera  ...  to 
explain  the  first  origin  of  life  upon  our 
earth,  has  no  other  resource  but  to  believe 
in  a  supernatural  miracle.”3  Hence  to 
avoid  this  imminent  but  distasteful  alter- 

1  The  Evolution  of  Man ,  vol.  ii.  cap.  xv. 

2  Ibid . 


u8 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


native,  the  scientist  counsels  the  accep¬ 
tance  of  an  unsustained  assumption  !  But 
this  is  speculation,  not  science.  And 
Virchow  has  himself  rebuked  the  intro¬ 
duction  of  this  gratuitous  hypothesis.  He 
says,  “  No  one  can  adduce  a  single 

positive  fact  in  evidence  that  such  spon- 

\ 

taneous  generation  ever  took  place,  and 
that  an  inorganic  mass,  even  of  this  firm 
of  Carbon  &  Co.,  was  ever  transformed 
into  an  organic  mass.  Nevertheless,  I 
admit  that  if  we  propose  to  imagine  to 
ourselves  how  the  first  organic  being 
could  have  originated,  there  is  no  alter¬ 
native  but  spontaneous  generation,  unless 
we  recur  to  creation.  Tertium  non  datur. 
But  spontaneous  generation  is  not  demon¬ 
strated,  and  we  shall  be  wise  to  wait 
for  its  demonstration.  We  remember  how 
lamentably  all  attempts  have  failed  to 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED.  119 

find  a  place  for  it  in  tracing  the  pas¬ 
sage  of  the  most  elementary  forms  from 
the  inorganic  to  the  organic  kingdom. 
Haeckel  will  never  be  able  to  explain  to 
us  how  from  the  midst  of  this  inorganic 
world,  in  which  nothing  changes,  life  can 
come  forth.  The  lapse  of  time  makes 
no  change  in  mechanical  laws  ;  and  if 
we  go  back  to  the  periods  of  incandes¬ 
cence  in  the  history  of  our  planet,  we 
may  fairly  be  reminded  that  intense  heat 
is  far  more  destructive  than  productive 
of  life.”1 

Thus  then  upon  this  theory,  unsustained 
“  by  a  single  positive  fact  in  evidence 
that  such  spontaneous  generation  ever 
took  place  ” — a  spontaneous  evolution  of 

1  Revue  Scientifque.  Dec.  8th,  1877.  Vide  A 
Study  of  Origins.  M.  de  Pressense,  bk.  II.,  cap. 
iv.  See  also  Dr.  Bree’s  Fallacies  of  Darwinism. 


120 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


life  from  any  primordial  forms, — hostile 
scientists  and  willing  doubters  fall  back 
with  every  ingenuity  of  suggestion  and 
variety  of  iteration  ;  for  if  this  theory 
fails  them,  then  they  have,  by  their  own 
confession,  “  no  other  resource  but  to 
believe  in  a  supernatural  miracle,”  “  no 
alternative  but  to  recur  to  creation.” 
Terrible  dilemma!  They  stand  alone, 
without  scientific  retreat,  confronted  with 
the  Christian  dogma  of  life  created  by 
an  intelligent  Will.  “  The  physical  laws 
may  explain  the  inorganic  world,  the 
biological  laws  may  account  for  the  de¬ 
velopment  of  the  organic  ;  but  of  the 
point  where  they  meet,  of  that  strange 
borderland  between  the  dead  and  the 
living,  science  is  silent.  It  is  as  if  God 
had  placed  everything  in  earth  and  heaven 
in  the  hands  of  nature,  but  reserved  a 


rJHE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


1 2 1 


point  at  the  genesis  of  life  for  His  direct 
appearing.”  1 

But  passing  from  himself,  what  account 
has  the  Sceptic  to  give  of  the  origin  and 
order  of  that  creation  of  which  he  is  a 
microcosm  ?  Whence  its  magnificent 
structural  arrangements,  the  sustained 

1  Natural  Law  in  the  Spiritual  World  (Drum¬ 
mond)  :  “  Biogenesis.” 

“  So  far  as  science  can  settle  anything,  this 
question  is  settled.  The  attempt  to  get  the  living 
out  of  the  dead  has  failed.  Spontaneous  genera¬ 
tion  has  had  to  be  given  up.  And  it  is  now 
recognised  on  every  hand  that  life  can  only  come 
from  the  touch  of  life.  Huxley  categorically 
announces  that  the  doctrine  of  biogenesis,  or  life 
only  from  life,  is  ‘victorious  along  the  whole  line 
at  the  present  day.’  And  even  whilst  confessing 
that  he  wishes  the  evidence  were  the  other  way, 
Tyndall  is  compelled  to  say,  ‘  I  affirm  that  no 
shred  of  trustworthy  experimental  testimony  exists 
to  prove  that  life  in  our  day  has  ever  appeared 
independently  of  antecedent  life/” — Ibid. 

Vide  also  art.,  “  A  Limit  to  Evolution,”  by  St. 
George  Mivart,  Nineteenth  Century ,  Aug.,  1884. 


122 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


actions  of  its  forces,  the  exact  and  admir¬ 
able  system  of  laws,  not  by  which,  but 
according  to  which  it  is  governed.  The 
“fortuitous  concourse  of  atoms”  theory 
was  recognised  as  preposterous  even  by 
a  pagan  philosopher. 

To  put  Cicero’s  argument  in  modern 
form:  As  well  indeed  imagine  that  the 
Bodleian  Library,  with  all  its  treasures 
of  thought,  was  the  product  of  a  series 
of  happy  accidents,  or  that  the  railway 
system  of  Great  Britain,  with  its  stupen¬ 
dous  work,  elaborate  organisation,  and 
constant  activity,  is  the  outcome  of  most 
fortunate  chances,  as  believe  that  the 
magnificent  order  of  the  universe  origi¬ 
nated  and  is  sustained  without  a  creative 
intelligence  and  a  governing  will.1 

1  “  Hoc  qui  existimat  fieri  potuisse  non  intelligo, 
cur  non  idem  putet  si  innumerabiles  unius  et 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


123 


Even  pessimists  and  evolutionists  are 
constrained  to  acknowledge  that  at  least 
“the  universe  looks  as  though  it  were 
planned  by  conscious  intelligence.”  Hart¬ 
mann  admits  “will  and  intelligence  at 
work  in  the  universe  shaping  its  develop¬ 
ment  ”  ;  but  into  what  straits  is  he  driven 
to  cancel  the  force  of  his  own  concession  ! 
He  says,  “the  will  was  unconscious,  the 
intelligence  blind”!  Haeckel  too,  in  the 
midst  of  many  negations  and  qualifica¬ 
tions,  says,  “  The  more  developed  man 
of  the  present  day  is  capable  of,  and 
justified  in,  conceiving  that  infinitely 
nobler  and  sublimer  idea  of  God,  which 
alone  is  compatible  with  the  monistic 
conception  of  the  universe,  and  which 

viginti  formas  literarum  vel  aureae  vel  qualis  libet 
aliquo  conjiciantur,  posse  ex  his  in  terrain  excussis 
annales  Ennii,  ut  de  inceps  legi  possint  effici.” 
— De  Natni'a  Deorum ,  lib.  iii.  37. 


124 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


recognises  God’s  Spirit  and  power  in  all 
phenomena  without  exception.  This 
monistic  idea  of  God,  which  belongs  to 
the  future,  has  already  been  expressed 
by  Giordano  Bruno,  in  the  following 
words :  ‘  A  spirit  exists  in  all  things, 
and  no  body  is  so  small  but  contains 
part  of  the  Divine  substance  within  itself 
by  which  it  is  animated.’  ”l  Mr.  Herbert 
Spencer,  in  a  recent  article,  says,  “Amid 
the  mysteries,  which  become  the  more 
mysterious  the  more  they  are  thought 
about,  there  will  remain  the  one  absolute 
certainty,  that  he  [man]  is  ever  in 
presence  of  an  infinite  and  eternal 
Energy,  from  which  all  things  proceed.”- 
And  Professor  Tyndall  has  said,  “  After 

1  Vide  The  Creed  of  Science  (W.  Graham,  M.A.). 
Cap.  i.  “  Creation  and  God.” 

2  “  A  Retrospect  and  Prospect.” — Nineteenth 
Century ,  Jan.,  1884. 


I25 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 

science  has  completed  her  mission  upon 
earth,  the  finite  known  will  still  be 
embraced  by  the  infinite  unknown.  And 
‘this  boundless  contiguity  of  shade,’  by 
which  our  knowledge  is  hemmed  in,  will 
always  tempt  the  exercise  of  belief  and 
imagination.  The  human  mind,  in  its 
structural  and  poetic  capacity,  can  never 
be  prevented  from  building  castles — on 
the  rock  or  in  air,  as  the  case  may  be — 
in  this  ultra-scientific  region.  Certainly 
the  mind  of  Carlyle  could  not  have  been 
prevented  doing  so.  Out  of  pure  unin¬ 
telligence  he  held  that  intelligence  never 
could  have  sprung,  and  so  at  the  head 
of  things  he  placed  an  Intelligence — an 
Energy,  which,  to  avoid  circuitous  para¬ 
phrase,  we  call  God.”1  Thus  hostile 

1  Speech  at  the  Unveiling  of  Carlyle's  Statue , 

Oct.  2 1  st,  1882. 


126 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


Positivism  and  unfriendly  science  are 
“  hemmed  in  ”  by  the  irresistible  neces¬ 
sities  of  actuality.  They  confess  an 
“  ultra-scientific  region,”  an  “  infinite  and 
eternal  Energy,  from  which  all  things 
proceed,”  and  which  finally,  to  “  avoid 
circuitous  paraphrase,”  is  designated 
“  God  ”  ! 

But  are  we  left  to  no  clearer  and  more 
decisive  expressions  on  the  part  of  ad¬ 
vanced  and  cultivated  thought  ? 

The  Savilian  Professor  of  Astronomy  at 
Oxford  says  :  “We  have  at  length  been 
brought,  by  philosophical  conclusions  from 
the  most  advanced  scientific  knowledge  of 
our  day,  to  the  philosophical  certainty  that 
matter  is  not  eternal,  but  that  from  the 
beginning  of  nature  it  was  endued  with 
some  very  wonderful  properties  by  some 
Intelligent  Will.  This  is  the  latest  and 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


127 


grandest  revelation  of  nature/’  1  A  noble 
and  notable  revelation  it  is  indeed,  to  be 
made  as  a  “  philosophic  certainty  ”  by 
“  the  most  advanced  science  of  the  day  ”  ! 

And  the  philosopher  and  metaphysician 
are  in  agreement  with  the  physicist. 
“  Creation,”  said  Sir  William  Hamilton, 
“  is  the  evolution  of  existence  from  pos¬ 
sibility  into  actuality  by  the  fiat  of  the 
Deity.”  “  There  is  one,  but  only  one 
Absolute  Existence,  which  is  strictly 
necessary ,”  says  Professor  Ferrier;  “  and 
that  existence  is  a  Supreme  and  Infinite 
and  Everlasting  Mind.”  2  “Atheism,” 
says  the  author  of  NatiHal  Religion ,  “is  a 
disbelief  in  the  existence  of  God  ;  that  is,  a 
disbelief  in  any  regularity  in  the  universe 
to  which  a  man  must  conform  himself 

1  Mod.  Science  and  Nat.  Religion.  S.P.C.K. 

2  Institutes  of  Metaphysic :  Prop.  xi. 


128 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED 


under  penalties.  Such  a  disbelief  is  specu¬ 
latively  monstrous  ;  it  is  a  kind  of  mental 
deficiency  or  perversion  :  but  so  commonly 
are  the  false  views  which  lead  to  immoral 
action.  There  is  an  atheism  which  is  a 
mere  speculative  crotchet,  and  there  is  an 
atheism  which  is  a  great  moral  disease.” 
And  again,  with  even  more  incisive  vigour, 
he  says,  “  of  atheism,  that  demoralising 
folly  of  human  nature,  which  consists  in 
the  inability  to  discern  in  the  universe  any 
law  by  which  human  life  may  be  guided, 
there  is  in  the  present  age  less  danger 
than  ever,  and  it  is  daily  made  more  im¬ 
possible  by  science  itself.”  1 
% 

And  what  says  that  distinguished 
naturalist,  the  renowned  Agassiz  ?  “  In 

my  view,  nothing  shows  more  directly  and 

1  Natural  Religion.  By  the  author  of  Ecce 
Homo.  Cap.  ii.  1882. 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED . 


129 


absolutely  the  operation  of  a  reflecting 
mind,  than  all  these  categories,  upon 
which  the  different  species,  genera,  families, 
orders,  classes  are  based  in  nature  ; 
nothing  more  clearly  indicates  a  deliberate 
consideration  of  the  subject  than  the  real 
and  material  manifestation  of  all  these 
characteristics  by  a  succession  of  indi¬ 
viduals  whose  life  is  limited  to  a  duration 
comparatively  very  short.  The  great 
marvel  of  all  these  relations  consists  in 
the  fugitive  character  of  all  the  parts  of 
this  great  harmony.  While  the  species 
is  persistent  during  long  periods,  the  indi¬ 
viduals  which  represent  it  change  con¬ 
stantly  and  die,  one  after  the  other  in 
rapid  succession.  Nothing  in  the  or¬ 
ganic  kingdom  is  calculated  to  impress 
us  so  strongly  as  the  unity  of  plan  which 
is  apparent  in  the  structure  of  the  most 


I 


130  THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 

various  types.  From  pole  to  pole,  under 
all  meridians,  the  mammalia,  birds,  rep¬ 
tiles,  fishes  exhibit  one  and  the  same 
structural  plan.  The  plan  denotes  abstract 
conceptions  of  the  most  elevated  order  ;  it 
far  surpasses  the  broadest  generalisations 
of  the  mind  of  man,  and  it  required  the 
most  laborious  research  to  enable  man  to 
arrive  at  any  adequate  idea  at  all  of  it. 
Other  plans  not  less  marvellous  disclose 
themselves  in  the  articulata,  the  molluscs, 
the  radiata,  and  the  various  types  of 
plants.  And  yet  this  logical  relation,  this 
admirable  harmony,  this  infinite  variety  in 
unity  represent,  we  are  told,  the  result  of 
forces  devoid  of  the  least  particle  of  intel¬ 
ligence,  of  the  faculty  of  thought,  the 
power  of  combination,  or  the  conception 
of  space.  If  anything  in  nature  can  place 
man  above  the  other  animals,  it  is  just  the 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED .  131 

possession  of  these  noble  powers.  With¬ 
out  these  gifts,  carried  to  a  high  degree 
of  excellence  and  perfection,  none  of  the 
general  marks  of  relationship  which  con¬ 
nect  the  great  types  of  the  vegetable  and 
animal  kingdom  could  be  perceived  or 
understood.  How  then  could  these  re¬ 
lations  have  been  conceived,  but  by  the 
aid  of  analogous  faculties  ?  If  all  these 
relations  are  beyond  man’s  intellectual 
power  to  grasp,  if  man  himself  is  but  a 
part  or  fragment  of  the  whole  system, 
how  could  this  system  have  been  called 
into  being  if  there  were  not  a  supreme 
intelligence,  the  Author  of  all  things?”1 

But  what  has  the  Sceptic,  who  boasts 
that  he  lives  for  the  present  and  the  seen, 


1  Address  to  the  Univ.  of  Massachusetts  :  Revue 
de  Cours  Scientijiques .  Vide  De  Pressense’s  Hist, 
of  Origins.  Cap.  iv. 


132 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED . 


and  rejects  the  supernatural,  and  who  com¬ 
forts  and  flatters  himself  that  in  some  way 
he  is  under  the  sheltering  segis  of  science, 
a  disciple  of  advanced  thought,  to  say  to 
these  “latest  conclusions,”  and  “grandest 
revelations  of  science  and  philosophy  ”  ? 
Does  he  pass  them  by  with  averted 
eyes  ?  or  does  he  venture  deliberately  to 
reject  them  ?  If  so,  on  what  intellectual 
grounds  ? 

With  what  weapons  of  “  logic,”  or  by 
what  process  of  “  pure  reason  ”  does  the 
Sceptic  propose  to  discomfit  the  physicist 
and  to  rout  the  metaphysician  ?  For  he 
must  find  himself  at  war  with  allies  whose 
aid  he  has  invoked.  He  is  like  that  un- 
happy  “  son  of  Zippor,”  who  having  sum¬ 
moned  a  seer  to  curse  his  enemies,  found 
the  prophetic  utterance  to  abound  in 
blessing.  “A  little  philosophy,”  said 


THE  SCEPTIC’S  CREED. 


133 


Bacon,  “  inclineth  men’s  minds  to  atheism  ; 
but  depth  in  philosophy  bringeth  men’s 
minds  about  to  religion.”  1 

Possibly  however  the  Sceptic  has  taken 
refuge  with  the  agnostic  at  the  modern 
shrine  of  “  the  Unknowable.”  But  surely 
this  very  designation  is  a  solecism.  The 
Unknozvable  must  be  at  any  rate  the  un¬ 
known  ;  but  with  what  logical  consistency 
can  anything  be  predicated  concerning 
the  unknown  ?  We  can  have  no  data  on 
which  to  arrive  at  any  determinate  con¬ 
clusion  concerning  the  unknown,  even  to 
the  extent  that  it  is  unknowable.  Of  the 
unknown  it  is  incompetent  to  say  that 
there  are  no  possible  conditions  in  which 
it  may  become  knowcible,  and  ultimately 
actually  knozvn . 

Mr.  Herbert  Spencer  indeed,  the  emi- 
1  Essays ,  xvi.,  “  Atheism.” 


134 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED . 


nent  exponent  of  agnosticism,  knows  so 
much  of  the  Unknowable  as  to  describe 
it  as  “the  All-Being,”  “the  Ultimate 
Reality,”  “the  Sole  Existence ”  ;  and  yet 
even  further  as  “  an  infinite  and  eternal 
Energy,  by  which  all  things  are  created 
and  sustained.”  ] 

Here  surely  the  chief  priest  of  the 
Unknowable  himself  leads  us  within  the 
felt  shadow,  into  the  recognised  presence 
of  the  supreme  Author  and  Sustainer  of 
all  being. 

But  around  this  shrine  of  the  Unknow- 

1  Vide  Nineteenth  Century ,  1884,  “Retrospect 
and  Prospect”  (January)  ;  and  “  Retrogressive  Re¬ 
ligion”  (July),  where  the  above  remarkable  admis¬ 
sion  is  made  and  defended. 

“  Men  are  constantly  affirming  certain  existences 
to  be  unknown  and  unknowable,  yet  in  the  same 
breath  affirming  relations  of  them  which  presuppose 
knowledge.” — G.  H.  Lewes:  Hist,  of  Philosophy  : 
“  Some  Infirmities  of  Thought.”  xciv. 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


135 


able  the  philosophers  are  themselves  at 
war  :  agnostic  and  Positivist  are  at  “  dag¬ 
gers  drawn.”  Mr.  Frederick  Harrison  tells 
Mr.  Herbert  Spencer  that  “  the  worship 
of  the  Unknowable  i$  abhorrent  to  every 
genuine  instinct  of  religion.”  “A  religion 
without  anything  to  be  known,  with 
nothing  to  teach,  with  no  moral  power, 
with  some  rags  of  religious  sentiment 
surviving,  mainly  the  consciousness  of 
mystery — this  is,  indeed,  the  mockery  of 
religion.”  1 

1  “  Agnostic  M  etaphysics.” — Nineteenth  Century , 
Sept.,  1884. 

Mr.  Harrison  further  writes  in  the  same  article  : 
“Mr.  Spencer  must  remember  that  in  his  religion 
of  the  Unknowable  he  stands  almost  alone.  He 
is,  in  fact,  insisting  to  mankind,  where  all  men 
have  some  opinion,  on  one  of  the  most  gigantic 
paradoxes  in  the  history  of  thought.  I  know  my¬ 
self  of  no  single  thinker  in  Europe  who  has  come 
forward  to  support  this  religion  of  an  Unknowable 
Cause,  which  cannot  be  presented  in  terms  of 


1 36 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


Does  the  Sceptic,  who  turns  his  back 
upon  the  first  principles  of  the  Christian 
religion,  hope  to  find  rest  and  satisfaction 
for  his  higher  life  in  a  “worship,”  that  one 
of  the  most  “  advanced  thinkers  ”  says, 
“is  abhorrent  to  every  genuine  instinct  of 
religion”?  Does  the  Sceptic  expect  to  find 
answer  to  his  questionings  or  content  for 

consciousness,  to  which  the  words  emotion,  will, 
intelligence  cannot  be  applied  with  any  meaning, 
and  yet  which  stands  in  the  place  of  a  supposed 
anthropomorphic  Creator.  Mr.  George  H.  Lewes, 
who  of  all  modern  philosophers  was  the  closest  to 
Mr.  Spencer,  and  of  recent  English  philosophers 
the  most  nearly  his  equal,  wrote  ten  years  ago  : 
‘  Deeply  as  we  may  feel  the  mystery  of  the 
universe  and  the  limitation  of  our  faculties,  the 
foundations  of  a  creed  can  only  rest  on  the  known 
a7id  the  knowablel  With  that  I  believe  every 
school  of  thought  but  a  few  dreamy  mystics  have 
agreed.  ...  So  say  agnostics,  materialists, 
sceptics,  Christians,  Catholics,  Theists,  and  Posi¬ 
tivists.  All  with  one  consent  disclaim  making  a 
religion  of  the  Unknowable.” 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


137 


his  heart  in  “  a  religion  without  anything 
to  be  known,  with  nothing  to  teach,” — save 
indeed  a  doctrine  of  despair,  that  the  God 
he  has  not  known  is,  alas  !  the  eternally 
Unknowable ?  This  surely  is  “retrogres¬ 
sive  religion,”  rather  than  “  advanced 
thought.” 

Eighteen  centuries  ago  there  was  an 
altar  in  ancient  Athens  inscribed,  “  Jo 
the  Unknown  God.”1  But  a  ray  of  hope 
lingered  around  that  shrine.  Its  inscrip¬ 
tion  left  open  the  possibility  of  a  more 
definite  dedication.  And  one  day  a 
stranger,  who  had  observed  in  the  city  the 
objects  of  Athenian  devotion,  proclaimed 
on  Mars  Hill,  “  What  ye  worship  not 
knowing,  I  declare  unto  you.”  The 
Athenian  confessed  that  he  wks  in  a 
gloom,  dimly  lighted  ;  but  the  door  of  his 


1  Acts  xvii.  16,  et  seq. 


138 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


temple  stood  open  to  the  morning,  and 
the  day  dawned  in  the  revelation  of  God. 
But  the  worshippers  of  the  Unknowable, 
not  only  say  that  they  are  in  the  dark, 
but  that  light  is  impossible;  that  this  night 
can  have  no  morning ;  that  a  constitutional 
incapacity  precludes  the  very  possibility 
of  their  ever  knowing  the  “All-Being,” 
the  “  Ultimate  Reality  ”  ;  that  they  have 
no  faculty  of  vision  for  the  Unseen,  that 
they  are  blind  men  worshipping,  not  only 
they  know  not  what,  but  what  they  never 
can  know.  This  indeed  is  a  doctrine  of 
despair. 

But  surely  there  is  the  indication  of 
hope,  even  in  the  agnostic’s  own  showing ; 
for  since  he  knows  so  much  of  the  Un¬ 
knowable  as  to  speak  of  “  an  infinite  and 
eternal  Energy,  by  which  all  things  are 
created  and  sustained,”  he  may  yet,  by 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


139 


the  happy  advances  of  sincere  and  patient 
inquiry,  know  more.  Talents  multiply  by 
use,  and  faculties  strengthen  by  effort. 
We  contend  that  the  agnostic  diagnosis 
is  at  fault ;  that  there  is  no  inherent  and 
essential  incapacity  in  the  nature  and 
constitution  of  man,  which  makes  the 
knowledge  of  the  “All-Being”  impossible. 
On  the  contrary,  we  affirm  that  it  has 
been  proved  to  a  demonstration,  in  the 
experience  of  a  multitude  that  no  man 
can  number,  that  in  the  economy  of  life 
in  which  man  is  placed  by  the  “eternal 
Energy  that  creates  and  sustains  all 
things,”  God  is  knowable,  and  that  the 
filial  hunger  of  the  human  soul  finds  its 
eternal  content  in  God’s  revealed  Father¬ 
hood. 

But  there  may  be  a  moral  and 
spiritual  obliquity  of  vision  making  dim 


140 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


the  eternal  light.  The  law  of  light  for  the 
inner  life  is,  “he  that  willeth  to  do  His 

•m 

will  shall  know  of  the  doctrine.”  Our 
fraternal  wish  is  that  through  some  open¬ 
ing  window  of  the  will  there  may  steal 
on  every  honest  agnostic  that  light,  more 
beautiful  than  the  light  of  morning,  which 
has  already  touched  some  of  their  number 
with  rosy  hope,  and  that  in  that  day- 
dawn  of  the  life  they  may  see  with  opened 
vision  the  Unseen,  and  know  Him  whom 
to  know  is  life  eternal.1 

But  is  there  any  other  scheme  devised 


1  An  able  and  appreciative  essay,  entitled  An 
Examination  of  Mr.  Herbert  SpencePs  Philosophy , 
has  been  published  by  the  Victoria  Institute, 
together  with  a  report  of  the  discussion  that 
followed  the  reading  of  the  paper  before  the 
society.  The  whole  is  worthy  of  a  careful  con¬ 
sideration  by  those  who  have  felt  the  influence  of 
Spencer’s  remarkable  powers. 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED.  14 1 

or  discovered  by  the  ingenious  research 
of  human  philosophy  that  can  satisfy  the 
needs  or  develop  the  possibilities  of  human 
life  ?  Is  there  any  other  point  of  the 
philosophical  compass  to  which  the 
Sceptic,  seeking  intellectual  prestige  and 
moral  content  and  safety,  may  run  for 
refuge,  and  find  it  ? 

Does  he  seek  sanctuary  at  the  altar  of 
Positivism,  and  shelter  under  the  great 
name  of  M.  Comte  ?  Does  he  hope  to 
enjoy  there  the  philosophic  calm,  and 
to  find  unanimity  among  “advanced” 
thinkers?  Alas  for  his  disappointment! 
He  will  find  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer  there, 
but  not  to  worship,  only  to  war.  The 
agnostic  chief  is  now  in  his  turn  the 
assailant.  He  defiantly  invades  the 
sacred  retreat,  mocks  the  famous  founder 
of  the  shrine  of  the  Positive  philosophy, 


142 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


and  wounds  with  the  keen  shafts  of  his 
ridicule  the  belated  worshippers  of 
Humanity.  He  derides  “the  absurdities 
of  the  Comtean  religion,”  and  “  dissents 
from  every  one  of  the  fundamental  prin¬ 
ciples  which  distinguish  his  system.” 1 
And  of  M.  Comte  himself,  Mr.  Herbert 
Spencer  says  that  he  manifested  “  a  height 
of  assumption  exceeding  that  ever  before 
displayed  by  a  human  being,”  and  that 
“he  exhibited  a  lack  of  mental  balance 
unparalleled  among  sane  people.” 2  All 
this  and  much  beside  Mr.  Herbert 
Spencer  urges  with  distinctive  vigour. 
Thus  the  unhappy  Sceptic  finds  neither 
peace  nor  protection  among  the  philo- 

1  Vide  The  Classificatio7i  of  the  Sciences : 
“  Reasons  for  dissenting  from  the  Philosophy  of 
M.  Comte.”  1871. 

2  “  Retrogressive  Religion,”  Nineteenth  Century , 
July,  1884. 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


143 


sophers.  He  is  wounded  in  the  house  of 
the  friends  among  whom  he  has  sought 
sanctuary. 

Positivism  advocates,  as  the  satisfaction 
of  that  religious  instinct,  deep  in  the  heart 
of  man,  of  which  Mr.  Frederick  Harrison 
has  told  us  so  much  and  so  many  things, 
the  worship  of  Humanity.  But  is  such 
a  worship  in  any  true  and  real  sense 
possible  ?  If  possible,  cut  bono  ?  What 
possible  good  can  accrue  either  to  the 
humanity  worshipping  or  the  Humanity 
worshipped  ?  M.  Comte  speaks  of 
“  veneration  and  gratitude  rising  into 
enthusiastic  admiration  of  the  Great 
Being  (Humanity),  who  is  the  author  of 
all  beneficent  progress.”  Mr.  Herbert 
Spencer  however  replies  to  this  that 
“  veneration  or  gratitude  to  any  being 
implies  belief  in  the  conscious  action 


144 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


of  that  being ;  .  .  .  gratitude  cannot 

be  entertained  to  something  unconscious. 
But  the  Great  Being  Humanity  has  no 
corporate  consciousness  whatever.  If  the 
Great  Being  Humanity,  who  is  the  author 
of  all  these  conquests  of  human  progress, 
is  unconscious,  the  emotions  of  veneration 
and  gratitude  are  absolutely  irrelevant.” 
And  he  adds  that  since  “  veneration  and 
gratitude  are  surely  due  somewhere,  they 
are  due,  if  due  at  all,  to  that  Ultimate 
Cause  from  which  humanity,  as  a  whole, 
in  common  with  all  other  things,  has 
proceeded.”  1  Thus  we  are  brought  back, 
even  by  the  hand  of  the  distinguished 
agnostic  philosopher,  from  the  worship  of 
Humanity  to  that  of  the  Supreme  Creative 
Being. 

1  Vide  “  Retrogressive  Religion”  (a  rejoinder  to 
Mr.  F.  Harrison),  nineteenth  Century ,  July,  1884. 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


145 


The  mythical  school  talk  of  “  adoring 
the  Universe”;  but  if  there  is  no 
“Supreme  and  Absolute  Mind,”  then  man 
is  the  crowning  work  of  the  universe. 
The  higher  however  must  not  worship  or 
adore  the  lower,  so  we  draw  back  to  the 
Positivists’  Humanity.  But  if  this  is  self¬ 
worship,  it  is,  as  Pere  Hyacinthe  has 
shown,1  only  a  thinly  disguised  egotism  ; 
or  if  it  is  the  worship  of  self  in  some  or  all 
of  human  kind,  it  is  “  what  is  called  to-day, 
in  rather  barbarous  French,  V altruisme? 

So  deep  and  dominant  is  the  instinct 
of  worship,  that  the  unbeliever  cannot  rest 
and  be  thankful  in  his  system  of  negations. 
The  agnostic  offers  his  “  veneration  and 
gratitude,”  his  dark  and  hopeless  worship, 
to  the  partially  known  Unknowable.  The 

1  “  Paganism  in  Paris,”  Nineteenth  Century , 
Feb,,  1880. 

K 


146 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


Positivist  has  his  sanctuary,  services,  and 
sacraments  ;  his  calendar  and  catechism  ; 
his  canonization  of  saints  and  solemn 
processions,  with  banners  having  “on  the 
white  side  the  holy  image,  and  on  the 
green  the  sacred  formula  of  Positivism  ”  ; 
and  his  “symbol  of  divinity  is  always  to 
be  a  woman  of  the  age  of  thirty,  with  her 
child  in  her  arms.”  “  Papal  assumption,” 
says  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer,  “is  modest 
compared  with  the  founder  of  the  religion 
of  Humanity.”1 

“What  is  Humanity?”  says  another 
advocate  of  free  thought,  Mr.  Goldwin 
Smith.  “  Is  it  an  abstraction  ?  I  must 
say,  I  would  rather  worship  a  stone  idol, 
which  at  least  has  real  existence.  Is  it  an 

1  Vide  Catechisme  Positiviste ;  Comte,  Paris, 
1874.  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer’s  “  Retrogressive  Re¬ 
ligion,”  and  Pere  Hyacinthe’s  “  Paganism  in 
Paris.” 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


147 


aggregate  ?  Then  it  excludes  the  wicked. 
Is  it  an  induction  ?  Then  it  will  be  in¬ 
complete  till  the  scene  of  history  is  closed. 
I  believe  that  it  is  an  ideal,  and  I  declare 
that  I  fail  to  see  how  it  differs  from  the 
ideal  of  the  Christian.”  1 2 

But  the  ideal  of  the  Christian  had 
“  corporeal  consciousness.”  He  was  “  the 
surprise  of  history  ”  ;  a  unique  person¬ 
ality,  who  “  appeared  among  the  wonder¬ 
ing  peoples  as  a  stranger  from  another 
sphere,”  and  by  doing  and  demanding  the 
hitherto  impossible,  He  burst  the  prison 
doors  of  reality  and  opened  the  path  of 
enlightened  liberty  and  immortal  hope  to 
men  of  every  land  and  age  and  condition.3 

1  “  Evolutionary  Ethics  and  Christianity.” — Con- 
temp.  Rev.,  Dec.,  1883. 

2  “  The  victory  over  disintegrating  egoism  and 

deadly  chillness  of  the  heart  will  only  be  won  by 


148 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED . 


And  they  who  through  Him  have  found 
the  way  of  the  new  life  are  a  countless  and 
ever-increasing  host. 

M.  Thiers,  looking  up  to  the  glory  of  the 
midnight  sky,  said,  ‘  C’est  la  ma  messe.” 
Three  thousand  years  before,  another 
gazer  at  the  same  wondrous  firmament 
exclaimed,  “The  heavens  declare  the  glory 
of  God.”  But  whether  did  the  ancient 

a  great  ideal,  which  shall  appear  amid  the  wonder¬ 
ing  peoples  as  a  4  stranger  from  another  world/  and 
by  demanding  the  impossible  unhinges  the  reality.” 
And  he  adds  in  the  same  chapter,  “  Whether 
the  battle  remains  a  bloodless  conflict  of  minds, 
or  whether,  like  an  earthquake,  it  throws  down 
the  ruins  of  a  past  epoch  with  thunder  into  the  dust, 
and  buries  millions  beneath  the  wreck,  certain  it 
is  that  the  new  epoch  will  not  conquer  unless  it 
be  under  the  banner  of  a  great  idea,  which  sweeps 
away  egoism  and  sets  human  perfection  in  human 
fellowship,  as  a  new  aim  in  the  place  of  the 
restless  toil  which  looks  only  to  personal  gain.” — 
Hist,  of  Matei'ialism  (Lange).  Cap.  iv.  “  The 
Standpoint  of  the  Ideal.” 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


149 


Hebrew  seer  or  the  modern  French  states¬ 
man  represent  the  more  truly  “  the  latest 
revelation  of  science,”  or  “  that  faculty  of 
worship”  which  even  Mr.  Fred.  Harrison 
admits  “  is  ever  fresh  in  the  heart  ”  ? 

An  invalid  mother  said  one  day  to  her 
child,  standing  by  the  foot  of  her  couch, 
and  apparently  delighted  with  some 
bonbons ,  “Do  you  love  them,  darling?” 
For  a  moment  there  was  a  perplexed  look 
on  the  bright  little  face,  and  then  the  child 
replied,  “No;  I  cannot  love  them,  they 
have  no  face.”  Deeper  wisdom  of  the 
innocent  life !  Love  implies  intelligent 
sympathy  and  responsive  affection  ;  but 
there  can  be  no  true,  ennobling  worship 
without  love  !  Man  may  admire  the  uni¬ 
verse,  and  gaze  with  wonder  and  rapt 
delight  at  the  starry  glory  of  the  midnight 
skies  ;  but  he  cannot  love  them.  “  They 


150  THE  SCEPTIC’S  CREED . 

have  no  face  ” — no  personality  ;  and  the 
personal  life  of  man  demands,  as  the  ob¬ 
ject  of  a  real  and  loyal  worship,  the  per¬ 
sonal  God.  There  can  be  no  true  worship 
of  an  absolute  mystery,  no  love  for  an 
“  All-Being  ”  of  which  nothing  is  known 
save  that  it  is  the  ever  Unknowable . 

Humanity  in  its  eventful  history  touches 
deeply  and  touches  many  chords  of 
thought,  feeling  and  sympathy ;  but, 
whether  considered  as  an  “  abstraction  ” 
or  an  “  aggregate,”  Humanity  has  no  “cor¬ 
porate  consciousness”  by  which  it  can  re¬ 
ceive  worship,  nor  any  “  conscious  action  ” 
by  which  it  can  refresh  the  worshipper. 
“I  would  rather  worship  a  stone  idol,”  says 
Mr.  Goldwin  Smith  ;  but  if  there  can  be 
found  in  humanity  One  who  is  the  human 
ideal,  albeit  illumined  with  some  splen¬ 
dours  of  a  higher  glory,  is  He  not  truly 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED . 


15I 

the  more  fitting  object  of  human  love  and 
homage  ?  However  that  may  be,  most 
certain  it  is  that  the  filial  longing  within 
the  human  soul  cannot  be  satisfied  by 
enkindling  the  sentiments  of  wonder,  awe, 
or  admiration.  It  wants  fellowship  — 
Fatherhood.  “Show  us  the  Father,  and 
it  sufficeth  us.”  1  And  that  great  human 
cry  has  not  been  left  without  response. 
One  has  declared  Himself  to  be  the  re- 
vealer  of  God,  and  to  bring  the  Divine 
within  the  range  of  human  apprehension. 
“  He  that  hath  seen  Me  hath  seen  the 
Father.” 

But  possibly  the  Sceptic  may  admit  the 

existence  of  a  “  Supreme  Intelligent  Will,” 

\ 

1  S.  John  xiv.  8,  9. 

For  a  very  admirable  and  exhaustive  treatment 
of  the  Theistic  argument  see  Professor  Flint’s 
Theism,  and  his  further  treatise,  A?iti-Theistic 
Theories.  (Blackwood  &  Sons,  Edinburgh.) 


152 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


“  the  One  Absolute  and  Everlasting  Mind.” 
Then  indeed  he  must  prefix  a  momentous 
article  to  his  creed,  viz.  “  I  believe  in 
God  ” ;  but  in  doing  so  he  concedes  half 
“the  Christian  dogma.”  On  what  evi¬ 
dence  however  does  he  make  this  large 
concession  ?  What  is  the  proof  that 
commands  his  assent  to  this  supernatural 
doctrine — a  fact  so  stupendous  in  itself, 
and  fraught  with  such  important  issues  ? 
In  kind  or  degree,  is  the  proof  in  this  case 
superior  to  that  which  is  offered  in  con¬ 
firmation  of  other  essential  verities  of  the 
Christian  faith  ?  I  think  not.  It  is  only 
the  first  grand  link  of  a  series,  by  which 
we  are 

“  Bound  by  gold  chains  about  the  feet  of  God.” 

Here  however  arises  the  grave,  practical 
question  :  if  the  Sceptic  acknowledges  the 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


153 


Supreme  Intelligence,  then  what  is  his 
relation  to  Him?  what  effort  is  the 
Sceptic  making  to  learn  the  Divine  char¬ 
acter,  and  to  do  His  will?  Surely  a  mere 
pagan  living  for  the  present  and  the  seen, 

I 

without  consideration  for  the  future  or 
reverence  for  the  unseen,  can  be  no  pro¬ 
per  result  of  an  honest  acceptance  of  that 
first  and  fundamental  article  of  the  Chris¬ 
tian  creed — belief  in  an  august  and  be¬ 
nevolent  Will — a  personal  God.  Professor 
Francis  A.  Newman  says  :  “  The  claim  of 
retaining  a  belief  in  God,  while  rejecting  a 
personal  God,  I  do  not  know  how  to  treat 
with  respect.  .  .  .  To  deny  personality 

to  God  denies  that  mind  and  morality  are 
part  of  His  essence,  and  denies  everything 
that  can  distinguish  God  from  blind  force 
or  blind  fate.  Such  an  application  of  the 
word  ‘  God  ’  is  delusive  and  evasive.  An 


154 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


atheist  may  thus  profess  to  believe  in 
God.” 

But  a  belief  in  a  personal  God  should 
work  itself  through  the  convictions  into 
the  character  and  out  into  the  life. 
Granted  the  existence  of  God .  it  cannot 
be  reasonable  to  exclude  the  thought  of 
Him  from  the  aims  and  acts  and  hopes 
of  life.  The  Sceptic’s  position  therefore, 
whose  creed  is,  “  I  believe  in  God,  but  I 
yield  Him  no  place  in  my  thoughts  or 
affections  ;  for  I  live  for  the  present  and 
let  the  future  take  care  of  itself,”  is  as 
irrational  as  it  is  immoral.  With  such  a 
Sceptic,  indeed,  unbelief  or  doubt  is  no 
longer  so  much  a  matter  of  mental  diffi¬ 
culty  as  of  moral  disinclination  ;  it  is  less 
a  question  of  the  intellect  than  of  the 
conscience  and  the  will. 

But  another  question  blocks  the  path  of 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


i5S 


the  Sceptic  :  “  What  becomes  of  the  per¬ 
sonal  life  at  what  is  called  death  ?  ”  At 
some  juncture  in  the  life  a  great  change 
transpires  ;  it  may  be  in  a  moment  or 
by  slow  degrees, — a  change  not  at  first  in 
the  material  measurement  of  the  physical 
frame,  but  in  the  disappearance  of  the 
vital  energies  of  the  reason  and  affections, 
of  the  understanding  and  volition,  which 
constitute  the  ego,  the  personal  self.  It 
has  disappeared — is  gone  :  whither  ?  What 
solution  does  unbelief  offer  to  that  pro¬ 
blem  ?  Is  the  solution  contained  in  that 
gloomy  polysyllable  annihilation ,  with  its 
maximum  of  measurement  and  minimum 
of  meaning  ?  Does  science  know  any¬ 
thing  of  this  dark  pretender,  annihilation  ? 
Science  speaks  of  the  conservation  of 
energy,  and  of  matter  as  changeable  in 
form,  but  indestructible  in  fact.  Are  we 


156  THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 

then  to  believe  that  the  corporeal  frame 
is  an  indestructible  quantity,  but  that  the 
inner  life,  the  proper  manhood,  with  all  its 
sublime  capacities,  possibilities,  hopes,  its 
filial  cry  for  God,  its  yearning  for  immor¬ 
tality,  falls,  before  the  arrow  of  the  archer 
Death,  into  the  dark  abyss  of  nothing¬ 
ness  ?  That  has  been  an  impossible 
thought  to  earnest  souls  from  the  days 
of  Pythagoras  to  the  present.  Kant  as¬ 
serted  that  “a  future  life  is  a  necessary 
postulate  of  the  practical  reason.” 

“No  life  that  breathes  with  human  breath 
Has  ever  truly  longed  for  death. 

’Tis  life,  whereof  our  nerves  are  scant, 

O  life,  not  death  for  which  we  pant  : 

More  life,  and  fuller,  that  I  want.” 

Deep  in  human  life,  when  brought  face 
to  face  with  this  grand  question,  lies  the 
conviction  that  at  death  the  dust  shall 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


157 


“  return  to  the  earth  as  it  was  :  and  the 
spirit  shall  return  unto  God  who  gave  it.”  1 
I  oppose  then  to  the  Sceptic’s  creed  of 
“Life  for  the  present,  let  the  future  take 
care  of  itself,”  under  any  of  its  many 
verbal  modifications,  “  Life  for  God,  in  the 
faith  of  Christ,  with  the  assured  hope  of 
immortality.”  And  I  ask  which  is  the 
worthier  symbol  of  belief?  which  is  the 
more  fitted  to  the  needs  and  possibilities 
of  human  being,  to  exalt  the  thoughts, 
regenerate  the  character,  to  quicken  and 
brighten  all  the  life  of  man  ?  I  commend 
to  the  Sceptic’s  serious  thought  the  Chris¬ 
tian  religion, — the  one  religion  that  pre¬ 
serves,  amid  all  the  mutations  of  time  and 
the  changing  aspects  of  human  thought 
and  need,  its  quenchless  vitality  and 
vigour.  As 


1  Eccles.  xii  7. 


158 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


“  — the  thoughts  of  men  are  widened  with  the 
process  of  the  suns/’ 

its  “  excelsior  ”  banner  still  waves  upon 
the  heights.  Amid  the  complicated  con¬ 
ditions  of  our  civilization,  Christianity  is 
still  at  the  head  of  every  benevolent 
enterprise ;  it  has  a  sympathy  for  every 
sorrow,  a  strength  for  every  burden,  for 
every  sin  a  Saviour ;  and  there  is  no 
purity  of  character  or  elevation  of  life, 
no  noble  aspiration,  but  finds  in  Chris¬ 
tianity  the  sanction  and  stimulus  of  a  yet 
higher  ideal.  Between  this  religion  and 
the  most  inquisitive  science  or  the  most 
cultured  intelligence  there  is  no  necessary 
antagonism.1  Christianity,  indeed,  often 
misunderstood,  often  misrepresented,  only 

1  “Under  their  seeming  antagonism  [Religion 
and  Science]  lies  hidden  entire  agreement.” — Mr. 
Herbert  Spencer,  First  Principles .  Cap.  i. 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED . 


T59 


attains  its  full  and  symmetrical  proportions 
in  an  atmosphere  of  enlightened  thought 
and  earnest  inquiry.  It  is  the  one  religion 
that,  at  the  present  day,  is  sympathetically 
busy  and  actively  helpful  in  the  world’s 
progressive  life.  Let  an  impartial  witness 
testify.  “  Progress  is  conterminous  with 
Christendom.  Outside  the  pale  of  Chris¬ 
tendom  all  is  stationary.  There  have  been 
noble  outbursts  of  material  wealth  and 
splendour,  transient  flashes  even  of  intel¬ 
lectual  brilliancy,  as  in  the  caliphates  and 
Mogul  empire,  though  the  light  in  these 
cases  was  mainly  borrowed  ;  real  and 
sustained  progress  there  has  been  none. 
Japan,  to  whatever  she  may  be  destined 
to  come,  has  kindled  her  new  civilization 
with  a  coal  from  the  Christian  hearth.1 

1  “  Evolutionary  Ethics  and  Christianity  ”  (Gold- 
win  Smith). — Contemporary  Review ,  Dec.,  1883. 


i6o 


THE  S  CEP  TIHS  CREED. 


Further,  let  me  commend  to  the  Sceptic 
the  more  careful  and  anxious  study  of  that 
remarkable  literature  in  which  Christianity 
finds  its  exposition  and  authority,  the 
Bible — a  book  sui  generis. 

The  Bible,  indeed,  is  not  so  much 
a  book  as  it  is  a  literature  :  the  deri¬ 
vation  of  its  title  tells  this  story.  It 
is  a  literature  of  fragments,  written  by 
different  men  —  dissimilar  in  tempera¬ 
ment,  culture,  rank,  and  social  habit  : 
separated  in  many  cases  by  the  long 
interval  of  eventful  centuries ;  written  too 
in  almost  every  variety  of  style  —  his¬ 
tory,  poetry,  proverb,  prophecy,  parable, 
ethics,  and  doctrine  ;  yet  somehow  gather¬ 
ing  all  together  into  one  interdependent 
and  organic  whole :  bibliotheca  divina — 
a  sacred  library — as  S.  Jerome  designated 
this  unique  literature  It  comes  to  us,  not 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED. 


161 


from  any  of  those  great  eastern  mon¬ 
archies,  distinguished  in  arms  and  arts,  in 
wealth  and  civilization,  contemporaneous 
with  its  earlier  books,  nor  from  that  land 
of  classic  wisdom  and  achievement,  whose 
most  brilliant  age  shortly  preceded  the 
writings  of  the  later  Testament,  but  from 
a  race  inferior  in  civilization  and  culture 
and  art  ;  yet  a  renowned  statesman  and 
eminent  scholar  has  said  of  one  single 
book  of  the  Bible,  “  All  the  wonders  of 
the  Greek  civilization  heaped  together 
are  less  wonderful  than  is  the  single  book 
of  Psalms.”  1 

In  every  age,  from  Longinus  to  Byron, 

1  Rt.  Hon.  W.  E.  Gladstone.  Speech  at  Edin¬ 
burgh.  - 

o 

“  Historia  instruit,  lex  docet,  prophetia  annun- 
ciat,  correptio  castigat,  moralitas  suadet ;  in  libro 
Psalmorum  profectus  est  omnium,  et  medicina, 
quaedam  salutis  humanae.” — S.  Ambrose. 


L 


1 62  THE  SCEPTIC’S  CREED. 

rhetorician  and  poet  have  praised  the 
style  and  beauty  found  in  the  Bible.  It 
lent  a  higher  glow  to  Milton’s  stately 
page,  and  Carlyle  invoked  its  aid  to 
give  vigour  to  his  trenchant  style.  The 
arts — painting,  music,  architecture — owe 
some  of  their  noblest  productions  to  its 
ever-flowing  inspiration.  But  it  has  a 
higher  function  and  nobler  mission  among 
men.  It  claims  to  be  “  able  to  make 
men  wise  unto  salvation  ” 1 ;  and  tens  of 
thousands  of  the  wisest  and  the  best 
have  acknowledged  the  validity  of  that 
unique  profession,  and  confess  that  they 
have  found  in  the  Holy  Scriptures  the 
secret  of  the  new  life,  the  “life  hid  with 
Christ  in  God.” 

Even  those  who  have  failed  to  find 


1  2  Tim.  iii.  15-17 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED.  163 

the  hidden  springs  of  the  Bible  have  yet 
confessed  the  wonder  and  the  wisdom  of 
it  in  language  aglow  with  a  generous 
admiration.  Let  us  call  a  scientist  to 
witness.  Speaking  of  the  influence  of 
the  Bible  in  education,  Professor  Huxley 
says :  “  I  must  confess  I  have  been  no 
less  seriously  perplexed  to  know  by  what 
practical  measures  the  religious  feeling, 
which  is  the  essential  basis  of  conduct, 

was  to  be  kept  up  in  the  present  utterly 

* 

chaotic  state  of  opinion  on  these  matters 
without  the  use  of  the  Bible.  The  pagan 
moralists  lack  life  and  colour,  and  even  the 
noble  Stoic,  Marcus  Antoninus,  is  too  high 
and  refined  for  an  ordinary  child.  Take 
the  Bible  as  a  whole,  make  the  severest 
deductions  which  fair  criticism  can  dic¬ 
tate  for  shortcomings  and  positive  errors  ; 
eliminate,  as  a  sensible  lay-teacher  would 


£64 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 


do  if  left  to  himself,  all  that  is  not 
necessary  for  children  to  occupy  them¬ 
selves  with,  and  there  still  remains  in 
this  old  literature  a  vast  residuum  of 
moral  beauty  and  grandeur.  And  then 
consider  the  great  historical  fact  that 
for  three  centuries  this  book  has  been 
woven  into  the  life  of  all  that  is  best 
and  noblest  in  English  history ;  that  it 
has  become  the  national  epic  of  Britain, 
and  is  familiar  to  noble  and  simple  from 
John  O’Groat’s  House  to  Land’s  End,  as 
Dante  and  Tasso  were  once  to  the  Italians; 
that  it  is  written  in  the  noblest  and  purest 
English,  and  abounds  in  exquisite  beauties 
of  a  mere  literary  form  ;  and  finally,  that 
it  forbids  the  veriest  hind  who  never  left 
his  village  to  be  ignorant  of  the  existence 
of  other  countries  and  other  civilizations, 
and  of  a  great  past  stretching  back  to  the 


THE  SCEPTICS  CREED.  165 

farthest  limits  of  the  oldest  nations  in  the 
world.  By  the  study  of  what  other  book 
could  children  be  so  much  humanised,  and 
made  to  feel  that  each  figure  in  that  vast 
historical  procession  fills,  like  themselves, 
but  a  momentary  space  in  the  interval 
of  two  eternities  ;  and  earns  the  bless¬ 
ings  or  the  curses  of  all  times,  accord¬ 
ing  to  its  effort  to  do  good  and  to  hate 
evil,  even  as  they  also  are  earning  their 
payment  for  their  work.”  1 

But  says  the  Sceptic  possibly,  “  I  cannot 
accept  the  theory  of  the  inspiration  of 
the  Bible.”  What  theory  of  inspiration  ? 
The  Bible  itself  has  formulated  no  theory 
of  its  own  inspiration.  The  Church  has 
pronounced  no  authoritative  definition  of 
inspiration.  Holy  Scriptures  are  their 

1  “  The  School  Boards.”  Contemp .  Rev.,  Dec., 
1870. 


1 66  THE  SCEPTICS  CREED. 

own  best  witness.  Human  definitions  are 
apt  to  be  too  strait  for  Divine  subjects. 
Those  who  know  the  Bible  best,  who  have 
drunk  most  deeply  at  its  hidden  springs, 
have  the  truest  understanding  of  its  in¬ 
spiration  ;  but  they  may  not  be  able  to 
define  the  divineness  of  it.  Let  the 
earnest,  honest  Sceptic  search  this  sacred 
literature,  look  into  it  with  eager  and  in¬ 
quiring  eyes,  even  as  they  who  watch  for 
the  morning  ;  and  upon  the  horizon  of  his 
life  will  some  day  dawn  a  ruddier  glow, 
the  herald  lights  that  broaden  into  day. 

My  sceptic  friend,  I  offer  you  these 
counsels  with  a  brother’s  heart.  The 
memory  of  sorrow  mellows  the  spirit  to 
sympathy  with  kindred  suffering.  I  too 
have  been  haunted  in  the  gloom  with 
spectral  forms  of  doubt,  disturbing  and 
distressing  with  their  ghostly  movement 


THE  SCEPTIC’S  CREED. 


167 


otherwise  peaceful  hours,  and  giving  many 
a  tremor  to  the  heart,  many  a  trouble  to 
the  mind.  Even  yet — not  indeed  when 
thought  is  most  wakeful,  and  the  vision 
strongest,  but  in  those  seasons  of  .dark¬ 
ness  and  of  dreams  that  fall  athwart  the 
life, — I  sometimes  imagine  that  I  see  the 
arras  tremble,  or  that  I  hear  strange 
footfalls  on  the  stair.  I  do  not  wish  you 
to  “  make  your  judgment  blind,”  but  rather 
that  you  should  “  fight  your  doubts  and 
gather  strength.”  And  in  the  foregoing 
cumulative  argument  it  has  been  my 
anxious  though  humble  endeavour  to 
help  you  to  “  face  the  spectres  of  the 
mind  and  lay  them,  that  at  length  you 
may  find  a  stronger  faith  your  own.” 
“  He  who  has  a  faith,  we  know  well,  is 
twice  himself.”  1 

1  Natural  Religion  :  vide  p.  35 . 


THE  SCEPTIC’S  CREED. 


1 68 


But  take  heed,  in  an  age  distinguished 
by  the  rapid  diffusion  of  knowledge,  the 
spread  of  education,  the  discoveries  of 
science,  and  the  increasing  luxuries  of 
material  possessions,  lest  the  hidden  life 
and  its  higher  needs  become  unheeded, 
lest  the  energies  of  faith  be  left  without 
due  exercise,  and  the  realm  of  their  proper 
activity  become  a  region  untravelled  and 
unknown.  “  With  our  sciences  and  cyclo¬ 
paedias,”  said  Carlyle,  “  we  are  apt  to 
forget  the  divineness  in  these  laboratories 
of  ours.  We  ought  not  to  forget  it. 
That  once  well  forgotten,  I  know  not 
what  else  were  worth  remembering.  .  .  . 
Man  cannot  know  either  unless  he  can 
worship  in  some  way.”  1  And  again  said 
this  stout  and  earnest  sage,  “  Without 
religion  constantly  present  in  the  heart, 

1  Hero  Worship. 


THE  SCEPTIC'S  CREED . 


169 


I  see  not  how  a  man  can  live  otherwise 
than  unreasonably,  than  desperately.”  1 
The  author  of  Ecce  Homo  bears  his 
testimony  also.  “The  scientific  life  is  less 
noble  than  the  Christian  ;  it  is  better, 
so  to  speak,  to  be  a  citizen  in  the  New 
Jerusalem,  than  in  the  New  Athens.” 2 
But  He  who  made  manifest  the  Divine 

Fatherhood,  who  “brought  life  and  im- 

» 

mortality  to  light,” 3  whose  voice  in  the 
process  of  the  ages  gains  both  in  volume 
and  clearness,  makes  known  a  faith  and 
worship  that  transcend  the  limitations 
of  locality  and  the  confines  of  sect. 
“There  is  neither  Jew  nor  Greek” — 
neither  Jerusalem  nor  Athens — “neither 
bond  nor  free”4:  “but  in  every  nation  he 

1  Life  of  Thomas  Carlyle ,  vol.  ii.  p.  264. 

2  Ecce  Homo ,  p.  xxiv.  3  2  Tim.  ii.  10. 

4  Gal.  ii i.  28. 


THE  SCEPTIC’S  CREED. 


170 

that  feareth  Him,  and  workcth  righteous¬ 
ness,  is  accepted  with  Him”1;  “the  true 
worshippers  shall  worship  the  Father  in 
spirit  and  in  truth,  for  the  Father  seeketh 
such  to  worship  Him”2;  “if  any  man 
willeth  to  do  His  will,  he  shall  know  of 
the  doctrine.” 3 

1  Acts  x.  35.  2  S.  John  iv.  23. 

3  S.  John  vii.  17. 


“BEYOND  CRITICISM.” 


HOURS  WITH  THE  BIBLE; 

OR, 

TH^:  SCRIPTURES  IN  THE  LIGHT  OF  MODERN  DIS¬ 
COVERY  AND  KNOWLEDGE. 

the  Rev.  CUNNINGHAM  GEIKIE.  D.D.,  Author  of 
“The  Life  and  Words  of  Christ,”  Etc. 

“My  aim  in  this  new  undertaking,  which  involves  almost 
more  labor  than  my  ‘Life  and  Words  of  Christ,’  has  been  and 
will  be  to  bring  all  that  I  can  gather  from  every  available  source 
to  bear  on  the  illustrations  of  the  Scriptures.  Not  a  dry  series 
of  papers,  but  a  pleasant,  attractive  illumination  of  its  pages 
by  the  varied  lights  of  modern  research  and  discovery.”— 
From  the  Preface . 

Yol.  I.  From  Creation  to  the  Patriarchs. 

“  II.  F  ROM  Moses  to  the  Judges. 

“  III.  F  ROM  Samson  to  Solomon. 

IV.  From  Rehoboam  to  Hezekiah. 

“  V.  From  Manasseh  to  Zedekiah. 

“  VI.  Completing  Old  Testament 

12mo,  Cloth,  with  illustrations.  $1.50  each. 

Sold  separately ,  and  each  complete  and  distinct  in  itself, 

REVIEWS. 

■v  “  The  harvest  is  here  gathered  for  the  reaper  .  .  .  its  sheaves  golden  clusters."— 

I'ulpit  Treasury. 

“  We  are  sure  that  those  who  read  this  work  will  take  the  Bible  to  their  hearts  as  neve* 
before.” — Pittsburgh  Methodist  Reporter. 

“The  labor  and  painstaking  simply  amazing.” — Good  Literatur e. 

“We  know  of  nothing  in  Biblical  literature  that  has  charmed  us  more  than  ‘Hour? 
with  the  Bible.’  ” — Canada  Christian  Advocate. 

“Deserves  a  place  in  every  Christian  home.” — N.  Y.  Independent. 

“Students,  teachers  and  preachers  will  here  find  treasures  of  priceless  wealth.”— 
Christian  Age. 

“  Modern  discovery  and  science  are  made  to  pour  their  contributions  of  light,  as  in 
one  blazing  avalanche,  upon  the  sacred  shrine  of  Scripture  Truth.”—  The  Preacher. 

“To  the  student  of  the  Bible  these  volumes  are  indispensable.” — Irish  Ecclesiastics 
gazette, 

“A  work  beyond  criticism.  Is  in  itself  a  whole  library.” — Churchman. 

“  Will  furnish  the  general  reader  precisely  what  he  wantr  to  know.” — N.  V.  Times. 


A  GREAT  WORK 


Natural  Law  In  the  Spiritnal  World. 

By  Henry  Drummond,  F.R.S.E.,  F.G.S. 

Cheaper  Edition,  438  Pages.  Price,  $1.50. 


CONTENTS  : 

MORTIFICATION, 
ETERNAL  LIFE, 
ENVIRONMENT, 
CONFORMITY  TO  TYPE, 
SEMI-PARASITISM, 
PARASITISM, 
CLASSIFICATION. 


PREFACE, 

INTRODUCTION, 

BIOGENESIS, 

DEGENERATION, 

GROWTH, 

DEATH, 


“  I  report,  as  a  man  may  of  God’s  work. — All ’s  Love , 
yet  all's  Law  A 

“  No  man  who  knows  the  splendor  of  scientific  achieve¬ 
ment  or  cares  for  it,  no  man  who  feels  the  solidity  of  its  method 
or  works  with  it,  can  remain  neutral  with  regard  to  religion. 
He  must  extend  his  method  into  it  or,  if  that  is  impossible, 
oppose  it  to  the  knife.” — Preface. 

FROM  THE  PRESS, 

“  We  will  begin  our  notice  of  this  most  remarkable  book  by  saying  that  every  one  who 
is  interested  in  religious  questions  should  read  and  study  it.” — London  Church  Quarterly 
Review. 

‘‘Its  originality  will  make  it  almost  a  revelation.” — Christiati  Union,  January  10. 

“This  is  one  of  the  most  impressive  and  suggestive  books  on  religion  that  we  have 
read  for  a  long  time.”— London  Spectator. 

“If  you  read  only  one  book  this  year  let  it  be  ‘Natural  Law  in  the  Spiritual  World.'” 
_ American  Institute  of  Christian  Philosophy. 

“This  is  one  of  those  rare  books  which,  treating  upon  familiar  subjects,  find  a  new 
point  of  view  from  which  old  things  themselves  become  new.” — Chicago  Standard. 

Grand  reading  for  the  clergy.” — Bishop  Coxe ,  Buffalo. 

“A  great  work.” — Bishop  Doanc ,  Albany. 

:‘In  Drummond’s  book  we  have  none  of  the  nonsense  of  the  new  theology,  but  the  old 
theology  splendidly  illuminated  by  the  ‘Drummond  light’  of  the  newest  scientific  knowl¬ 
edge.”—  Dr.  Henson,  Chicago. 

“  Fresh,  clear  and  suggestive.  Just  the  book  for  every  minister  and  intelligent  Chrij 
tian.”— Dr.  Haighy  Chicago. 


JAMES  POTT  &  CO.,  PUBLISHERS,  NEW  YORK. 


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